


If This is to End in Fire

by CosmicJourney



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Hurt Jim, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Childhood Sexual Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Jim Kirk Needs a Hug, Original Character(s), Past Child Abuse, Past Torture, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Tarsus IV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2016-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-11 01:26:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3310709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CosmicJourney/pseuds/CosmicJourney
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The mission had been simple- simple and boring and virtually impossible to mess up. So of course it had to end in fire, destruction, rebellion, corruption, and Jim Kirk, standing alone in the middle of it all- alone except for a tiny baby girl, representing everything Jim stands for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"Ooh, what's this?" Jim held up a fleshy blue fruit, around the size of his palm and shaped like a seven-pointed, round-tipped star. The fruit caught the light from the planet's twin suns, and the glimmer it reflected was a deep indigo hue, like it couldn't quite decide between blue or violet.

Spock approached him from behind, crouching at his shoulder. "That, Captain, is a Shar'k'yui fruit, the name originating from the Frooliin word sharkr-frryj, meaning 'star fruit'."

Jim twirled the fruit in his hand, squeezing it a bit and surprised to find it quite resistant to pressure. "Is it edible?"

"Negative. The Shar'k'yui fruit is highly dangerous to humans, though it is considered a delicacy to most other races."

The captain held out the fruit to his first officer. "I dare you to eat it."

Spock raised one eyebrow, and Jim knew from experience this was not his 'Jim-what-the-hell-are-you-talking-about' face, this was his 'this-is-highly-illogical-but-sounds-kind-of-fun' face. "You dare me, sir?"

Jim nodded seriously. "I dare you to eat it. If you don't, you have to let Uhura put makeup on you, and you have to wear it for all of Alpha shift."

"Jim!" Both men sprang to their feet in record time, nearly knocking each other over in the process, equally startled by McCoy's approach. The doctor looked irate, his boots sending up clouds of dust with every step and his sweat-drenched face clenched in fury while he stuck his tricorder out at the two of them accusingly. "Are you out of your mind?!"

"Spock did it!" Jim replied, grabbing the Vulcan's hand and slapping the fruit into his open palm.

Spock's eyes widened. "I think you will find that it was indeed the Captain who initiated the-"

McCoy held up his hands, telling them without words to shut the hell up before he hypo'd the both of them. "You two are complete and utter imbeciles and you are so damn lucky that it is too hot on this god-forsaken planet to plot either of your murders. Get back to work."

Work, it turned out, wasn't much but cataloguing plants and animals on the planet Clooxee in a solar system located roughly nine parsecs from where Vulcan had once stood. Open communication and trade with the occupants of the planet had long since been established, but there had never been a formal investigation into its native life forms. The mission would only take a few days, but the work was hot and boring, so naturally Jim had taken to annoying his crew whenever McCoy wasn't looking.

The two men watched the doctor leave, and when he was out of sight beyond a copse of trees, Jim turned back to Spock. "Okay, Spock, you have to-"

However, the first officer had already taken a bite of the fruit and was chewing thoughtfully. "The fruit's taste could be described as remarkably similar to that of a Terran onion."

"Oh. That's gross," Jim grimaced, his gaze falling to the ground where he'd found the fruit. "I wonder where it came from?"

"Without over explaining things, Captain, I recommend you look up." Spock spoke around another mouthful of the fruit, apparently not experiencing any negative affects despite his human heritage.

Jim did as instructed, and was startled to see the trees making up the forest reached high enough that their canopies were completely obscured by clouds. The trees themselves were thin and silvery gray with bark that possessed a shaggy, moss-like texture. No branches could be seen splitting off from the trunks, so Jim supposed they only separated at the canopy. "Wait a minute, how did that thing survive a fall from so high?"

"The height of the trees is much lower then what one might expect." Spock answered, his own tricorder out as he circled one of the slim poles. "The clouds on this planet are incredibly dense and so float much lower than on most. In fact, this entire planet bears a remarkable resemblance to twenty-first century Earth during the phenomenon known as global warming."

"Well, that explains why everything looked white from above," Jim grumbled, dutifully examining a low-lying shrub with feathery purple needles. "What're they doing here to cause such a radical climate change, anyway?"

Spock appeared thoughtful, as though he'd pondered over the same thing. "No one knows. The Frooliin are a very private people, peaceful and content with a simple way of life, so it's unlikely they are working on anything potentially destructive. However, whatever it is has been releasing massive amounts of carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the air, creating the cloud cover that keeps in heat from the suns. The greenhouse effect, is what humans call it."

"Spock, I'd say you have a certain degree of fascination with global warming," Jim grumbled, wiping sweat off his brow.

The first officer gave one of his little not-smiles. "Yes, well, this climate is much more to my liking then most we've encountered."

Jim realized for the first time that Spock actually seemed at home in the muggy heat, and for a moment he worried if the Vulcan was ever uncomfortable aboard the Enterprise. He was about to ask when he heard McCoy's voice calling again, this time sounding considerably less grouchy. "I guess we're done for today."

The two men began the walk back to the rendezvous point in companionable silence, something Jim was always grateful for with Spock. Between them, words weren't needed, and for the first time in his life the quiet didn't make him feel ignored.

Despite that feeling of companionship, Jim couldn't shake the uneasiness he felt, walking through the dull silver woods. Everything about this place reminded him of a time long ago, and though the memories hadn't become overwhelming, they were enough to put him on edge and disrupt his sleep.

The forest was ominously silent and undisputedly beautiful. Mist wreathed about gracefully reaching trunks like this planet's ethereal version of ivy, seemingly seeping from the moss-like bark and from underneath large boulders. Even the earth had a grayish tone, as though the entirety of the sky was being reflected, silver dust and soot scattered on a dying planet which didn't quite know how to die. The flora and fauna on this planet were remarkable versatile and adaptable, clinging with stubborn roots to nitrogen-poor soil and perpetually marshy ground.

Perhaps the most unsettling thing about the forest was the scarcity of undergrowth. Well, unsettling to Jim, because there was nowhere to hide- not that they'd need to hide, of course, but old habits die hard and you can never be too careful. He wondered how the animals of the world survived in such vulnerable conditions when the very thought of it made him shudder.

The two men reached the edge of the woods, where the trees cut off sharply and the bare earth gave way to waves of ashen grass. The field was small and vaguely circular, positioned on a slight hill that dropped off into a larger stretch of forest. The team had beamed down here, and their uniforms were strikingly bright against the gray all around. Jim and Spock approached the gathered crewmen, and were intercepted halfway by a very concerned looking McCoy.

"Spock ate the thing." Jim said quickly.

"You-" Spock began, but stopped immediately, knowing there was no point arguing with the- remarkably immature- captain. "Yes. I indeed ate the thing."

"Apparently it tastes like an onion."

"Quite vulgar, really."

"And yet he ate it."

"I was threatened."

"It was a dare."

After the first couple sentences, McCoy seemed to stop listening and instead glared at both men until they stopped talking. "Ensign Martin found something," his voice got lower, considerably more solemn, "it's not good, Jim."

Ice flowed through him, killing the playfulness of just a moment before. He straightened up, steeling himself for whatever had been found. "Show me."

The settlement was in ruins.

What had been beautifully crafted stone buildings were now little more than charred rubble, strewn across the clearing, smoke and still blazing fires rising from the remains. The village, a little over a mile from where the team had beamed down, was rather large, at least in comparison with most other settlements on the planet.

Jim could only imagine what it had looked like in its prime. Great stone arches engraved with mindless patterns, blockish buildings with rounded edges and spires that reached to the sky, twining sculptures of hardened white clay- all left crumpled in an inescapable maze on the ground.

Spock stood at Jim's right shoulder, McCoy at his left, all three standing at the edge of the village along with the three young ensigns they'd brought along. Jim turned to McCoy. "Take the ensigns and check for survivors. Don't leave the settlement, and be on guard." The doctor nodded in response and waved over the ensigns.

By his side, Spock surveyed the scene with apparent detachment, which Jim had learned by now to be no more than a device he implemented in order to analyze a situation. "According to my estimates, the attack occurred exactly four-point-seven-four-two hours ago, around an hour before we arrived. We could not detect anything amiss due to the cloud cover."

Jim exhaled, grimly thinking that some of the inhabitants may have died in the hours they'd spent cataloguing life forms. Then again, they were lucky they'd found the settlement at all, if Spock's analysis was anything to go by. Together the two men carefully picked their way around a half-tumbled building and stepped into what had been the center of the village.

Ash rose around their boots, smearing their uniforms with pale gray as they took in the damage. From the center of the village, it was obvious the entire settlement had been situated around this small town square, upwards of twenty buildings turned to dust. Spock trailed one slender-boned hand over a chunk of decimated rock, his slanted eyebrows furrowing further in bemusement. "Captain, I hear something."

Jim's focus snapped back from where it had been wandering a moment before in memories he really shouldn't think about. Ever. "What is it?"

Spock straightened, beckoning to his captain to follow him into one of the collapsed structures on the left side of the square. Closer to the building now, Jim could hear the sound: thin, plaintive wailing, and his heart soared in hope. "A child, Captain. It appears to be buried somewhere in the rubble."

"Right, okay. Help me out-" Together the two men shifted a large rock that had been resting diagonally across another, and as the grinding sound stopped when the rock was cleared, the cries became louder. "Just one more, and I think we'll reach 'em."

It was actually two more rocks that had to be moved before Jim caught sight of pink fabric in the shadows of the stone. He enlarged the hole a bit until he had a clear sight, and he lifted the infant out of the rubble.

The infant was beautiful, and the sight of her made Jim grin even as he wiped stinging sweat from his eyes. Her skin was deep crimson red, and despite looking to be no more than two months old, her raven-black hair was long and sleek, tucked into the pink cloth she was wrapped in. The baby opened her mouth wide and began to wail again, and instinctively Jim cradled her close and shushed her gently.

"The child is a Frooliin," Spock observed from behind Jim, his presence as sturdy and assuring as ever. "She appears to be uninjured, as her lungs are obviously functioning at optimal capacity." He whipped out a scanner from his belt and began wandering about the rubble of the decimated house, searching for more life signs.

Jim had never seen a Frooliin before, at least not in the flesh. Though she was very young, certain aspects of her race were already emerging in the shape of her wide-set eyes, ridged cheek bones, and small finlike ears. He held her up and bounced her a bit, trying to calm her cries. "Shh, shh," he repeated, somewhat helpless, feeling suddenly very young and very stupid.

"As expected, there are no further life signs from this house," Spock reported as he reappeared from behind a pile of rubble. "It is safe to assume the child's parents are dead."

Jim sighed heavily, holding the infant's head against his shoulder. "Great. How are we going to-"

He didn't get to finish as the ground suddenly lurched beneath him. He gasped, just barely managing to regain his balance before he saw the fire rushing towards them. "Get down!" he screamed, grabbing Spock and hiding behind the collapsed wall as the explosion blazed past them. Searing heat surrounded them, and Jim held the infant as closely as possible, trying to keep her safe from the scorching blast. Just as quickly as the explosion had occurred, it was gone, and both men ran from their feeble shelter.

"What the hell?!" McCoy emerged from another building not far away with the three ensigns, all of them scraped up and singed but otherwise unhurt. "Jim! Spock! Are you okay?"

"We're okay, Bones. Just-" He looked up. An object streaked down from the gray sky, reminiscent of a comet, burning bright red with a tail that threw off yellow sparks. "Shit," he muttered, and everyone else looked as well. "Shit, shit, shit- we're being bombed! Get back in the building- go!" McCoy and the ensigns ran as fast as they could, hiding again in their insufficient stone shelter.

Jim and Spock sprinted as well, Spock hiding immediately with his back to the wall. Jim was slower, and as the bomb hit the ground, the great lurch of the planet sent him onto his hands and knees. He let go of the baby at the last minute, and Spock managed to pull her to safety just before the bomb exploded.

Jim saw fire. It spiraled about him and seared through his uniform, cocooning him in unbearable heat, licking against any bare skin it could find and singing the hair off his arms. Luckily, he'd had the sense to cover his head and essentially curl into a ball before the wave had hit, so his back got the brunt of the attack.

He screamed as his skin turned to fire, but still he could not close his eyes, could not look away from the flames as they surrounded him. The stench of burning flesh brought all those memories to the surface and he was going to throw up, from the pain and from the smell and from knowing he'd seen this all before, he'd felt it all, up close and personal and he was burning all over again-

The flames passed and still he was burning, choking to breathe through the smoke and the smell and finding he couldn't- his lungs were charred too, and he was gasping but it hurt, a thousand needles stabbing his throat-

Spock was at his side, that was good- but he couldn't see, the world was too dim after staring into the heart of fire, and his eyes were watering with smoke. He felt strong hands grip his upper arms- he screamed a little bit, because the movement pulled his melted skin- and drag him into the shade of the ruins where he could hear the child crying. She was okay, which was also good.

"Captain," Spock's voice revived him just a bit as his first officer helped him into a sitting position against the wall. That hurt like a son of a bitch but he didn't tell Spock, couldn't even hear him speaking as he pulled his communicator from his belt.

"Kirk to Enterprise," he rasped, his voice sounding like his vocal chords had gone through a meat tenderizer. "Come in, Enterprise."

"Captain?" Sulu's voice came in over the communicator.

"Beam us up immediately," he voice was cut off by a round of harsh coughing that shook his entire body and rattled his frame. "We're under attack- get us out of here."

Spock was looking up at the sky, his dark eyes trained on where the last bomb had appeared. For several moments they were silent, holding baited breaths will the seconds ticked by.

"Captain," Sulu said, sounding uncharacteristically rattled. "We as well are under attack- three ships of unknown origin have us surrounded and are threatening destruction should we not turn back." Jim cursed, but Sulu wasn't done. "Also, sir, we have a problem with the transporters. We can't get a reading on all of you. Some of you may be left behind."

Several beats of silence passed between them in which Jim grit his teeth against the urge to curse and scream. "Just… just get who you can and get the hell out of here, Sulu. That's an order." He snapped shut the communicator and his arm fell down to his side, suddenly too weak to hold anything.

"Jim-" Spock began to speak, and Jim turned his head to look at him, preparing a small reassuring smile on his lips and an 'I'm fine' on his tongue, but suddenly Spock was fading, sparkling atoms swirling and dancing through the air, breaking his first officer apart to put him back together onboard the Enterprise.

When Spock had disappeared, he sat there, listening to the soft cries of the child at his side. He heard nothing aside from her screams. The rest of the team he'd beamed down with were gone as well, then. All safe on the ship and hightailing away from this hellhole of a planet.

Jim gave a rasping sigh, gathering the child in his aching, melted arms. He swallowed thickly, not sure what to say, if anything. "Here we go again," he finally muttered.


	2. Chapter 2

Some deeply buried, intensely selfish part of Jim wanted to stay in the rubble of the collapsed village, enduring the bombs and the pain, letting himself go numb from every lurch of the earth and every fire that swept past. He was already halfway there, drifting blissfully, thinking the air had gotten pleasantly cool in the last ten minutes, staring at a blank face of rock, charred and shattered over the ground while dark gray smoke drifted around the forgotten town in lazy tandem.

He breathed slowly, shallowly, distantly wondering if his lungs were black and swollen, bearing a resemblance to the lungs of those old-age smokers. He remembered seeing pictures in school, wondering why anyone would deliberately poison their body. Just two years later, he took his first drink and never really put the bottle back down. The irony made him want to laugh but that brought him back to the problem with his lungs, which currently felt like they were filled with gravel.

He wanted to stay in the quiet and the smoke, listening to the rasping sounds of his breath, waiting for the Enterprise to return, knowing it will, knowing because they wouldn't leave him here alone even if he told them to they'll come back they won't let it happen to him again-

The baby in his arms wailed.

Jim started, the movement making his back slide against the wall behind him. He bit his lip so as not to scream, the burns making their presence known once again. The fog in his mind lifted, the pleasant chill dissipated, the blissful numbness evaporated into thin air and he was here again, poisoning his lungs with every breath he took and more importantly, so much more importantly, endangering the life of a baby.

Before he really knew what he was doing, he was standing, lurching to his feet using one arm to cradle the infant and the other to stabilize himself against the wall. The moment he straightened, he remembered the tiny fact that they could very well still be under attack. But no bomb had fallen since the one that'd so graciously ripped open his back. Of course, he had no idea how long ago that had been, but he was reasonably sure the immediate danger had passed. So with a relatively clear mind (who's dropping bombs why are they trying to kill people what's going on who's attacking my ship I hope they got away safely please don't come back I have a bad feeling about this something awful is going to happen but if you happen to get together a fleet and want to bring me home well I'd be fine with that) he stepped out into the town square.

Surrounding the place where the bombs had detonated, soot stained the ground, stopping in a semi-circle where he'd lain. Seeing the silhouette of his body on the ground made the pain flair up again, but he pushed it to the back of his mind as he tried to decide where he should go. More than anything he wanted to go back to the rendezvous point to wait for the Enterprise, but he knew that was stupid and he needed to stop thinking about rescue. He needed to think about survival.

Logically, he knew he needed to keep moving. He needed to find running water and food and shelter and, if he was lucky, some friendly locals to take the kid off his hands. Finally he decided to go east, opposite the direction of the rendezvous point. He picked his way around fallen rubble, an entirely different maze than before, completely reset by the last two bombs, until he finally reached the eastern edge of the village.

The village was situated on a gentle hill, so he'd have to go down the slight rise in order to reach the sky-high forest, and to who-knows-where after that. He walked slowly, trying not the jostle the infant in his arms who now seemed to be sleeping soundly, her head against his shoulder. At the bottom of the rise he stopped, swallowing down the unease as he saw again the scarcity of undergrowth in the sunlight-choked forest. Squashing down that age-old instinct, he stepped forward, allowing the shadows to swallow him up.

Jim doubted he'd ever get used to the ethereal beauty this planet had to offer. Like the lack of sunlight had leached all the color from the soil, and the rest of the world simply didn't have the inspiration to carry on with the hues it had once embodied. Or perhaps he was simply delusional, he thought after an hour of walking with no apparent change in scenery. It was the same shaggy-moss trees, randomly placed weathered boulders, and low-lying colorless shrubs. Maybe he was going in circles- but he didn't think so, since he's pretty sure he'd remember seeing that not-so-subtly phallic rock over there.

When finally, delirious with pain and exhaustion, Jim had to stop walking, he fell to his knees in front of one of the sky-reaching trees. He couldn't even tell if it was nighttime, or if the forest had gotten any darker during his agonizing walk. Breathing hard, fighting the nausea rising in the pit of his stomach, he pressed his forehead to the shaggy tree both for the support it offered and for the coolness it seemed to radiate. The child in his arms had awoken not long ago, wailing again in an unarguably healthy voice that contrasted with his own raspy breathing.

After carefully leaning his side against the tree, Jim uncovered the child's face and smiled down at her, hoping she was too young to see he was scared or unsure or whatever. He'd learned pretty early on that kids don't take well to their caretaker's weakness. "Hey, babe. You hangin' in there?"

The infant blinked up at him owlishly, her eyes scrutinizing him. Her eyes were really very strange, he'd decided early on. Besides being very large and wide-set, the iris took up the majority of the eye, reducing the sclera to a thin ring of white around the rim. The pupils were large as well and were extremely sensitive to light, in seconds going from the size of a penny to the size of a pinhead. It was disconcerting, really. And all that without taking into account the actual color of her irises, which was a rich, shimmering gold that stood out even in the dark.

"Yeah, I know I look like shit," he grumbled, bouncing the baby on his knee. "We can't all have fucking unicorn eyes, you little fish-thing." The child giggled, showing sharp teeth that, along with her fin-like ears and ridged cheek bones, gave her a rather frightening appearance. "Scratch that. Little shark-thing." She laughed again and he found himself smiling back, his thirst and hunger and pain and exhaustion forgotten, if only for a little while.

That night (night? Day?) was one of the worst he'd ever experienced, and that was truly saying something. He entertained the baby until she had finally fallen asleep again, her mouth drooping open and soft noises signifying her deep, even breaths. For hours he lay like that, his side against the trunk of the tree, staring out into the forest, unable to close his eyes.

He wasn't afraid. No, he told himself over and over, he wasn't afraid, never afraid again, not of this, but its hard to convince himself when he smells burning flesh and hears Kevin screaming for help and watches Mara fall as a phaser blast tears through her. And he's thirsty and on edge and in pain and with ever shiver that wracked his over-stressed body he sees another friend dying-

Jim awoke, gasping, sobbing for breath, sweating in the heat and shivering with the force of his long-suppressed memories. For a long moment he sat there trying to keep his head together, trying to stave off the despair and fear and hopelessness and failing, failing miserably. Some captain he was, unable to keep hold of his sanity after one fucking night alone in a dark forest. But he didn't know, couldn't have known, that the open, white-lipped blisters across his back had burst, and the infection was setting in fast.

Coherent thought was becoming more and more difficult, but he steeled his resolve. Carefully he picked up the infant and staggered to his feet, sweat slicking his skin and a bright fever-blush across his ashen face. He set off in the direction he'd been going, trying his best not to stumble on the rocky soil.

An hour passed.

An hour, and the baby was awake and crying, probably starving. Jim was thirsty and exhausted and hungry as well but the thought of eating anything made him violently sick, heaving up bile behind one of the shaggy moss-trees. Still he stumbled on while his head pounded and his face burned and he couldn't see straight, could hardly walk.

The trees began to thin out. He didn't realize it at first, until the pervasive smell of burning flesh that had seemed to follow him around was replaced with the fresh, clear smell of running water. He was sure he was delirious, his mind trying to appease his waning sanity by giving him what he wanted most. However, when the trees finally stopped, he saw the thing he'd most hoped for.

A broad creek, moving slowly and peacefully in a serpentine path through the woods, slicing the forest through as it gurgled softly over the banks. The water was deep and clear down to the bottom where smooth stones in a thousand different colors rested. Jim have a short, choked laugh that probably sounded closer to a sob as he stepped forward, completely entranced by the sight of the water.

He set the baby down on the bank after he fell to his knees beside the water. Without preamble he dunked his head in, relishing the cool rush of it across his heated skin, and drank and his fill in huge, heaving gulps. He came up for air eventually, breathing hard and feeling revitalized by the chill. Briefly he wondered how he would go about getting the child to drink, but it turned out the baby was perfectly capable of drinking from his cupped hands in front of her lips.

For an indefinite amount of time they sat on the bank, Jim suddenly completely unsure what to do, where to go, like the fog in his mind had lifted and here he was- on the bank of a river in the middle of nowhere with no rescue in sight and a baby, who was at the moment chewing gently on his fingers with pin-sharp teeth. "You doing okay, babe?" He found himself talking, stroking the baby's long black hair, caressing the soft plumpness of her dark red cheek. "Wish you could tell me what happened back there. You probably didn't even see much. Just a lot of noise and suddenly you're all alone, buried under a wall."

Huge, liquid gold eyes stared back at him, full of a blossoming trust and adoration. His throat felt like it was closing up, but he pressed on. "I just hope everyone got out of here. Sulu sounded pretty shook up, which isn't like him. You'd like Sulu. Hell, everyone likes Sulu. No one ever has a bad word to say about him. Except Chekov. Says he's reckless and too smart for his own good- all that couple-y stuff. It's really pretty cute."

He stopped, and the infant lifted her short, chubby arms, reaching for his face. She had six fingers on each hand, the extra one being a second thumb that came after her pinky. She grazed her slightly webbed fingers across his cheek, a wide smile showing all of her sharp little teeth. Jim grinned in reply, unprepared for the rush of affection he felt for the little girl. That affection, more then regard for his own health, was what propelled him to plan again.

"Alright, we should follow the creek downstream," Jim said out loud, having found that talking to the infant lifted some of the horrible anxiety off of his shoulders.

The girl turned her face to the water again, and Jim, thinking she wanted another drink, set her down on the ground and turned away to scoop some water up into his hands. The next thing he heard was a small splash, and when he looked over where he'd set her, all that was left was her pink blanket, discarded in the mud.

He didn't hesitate, hardly had a single thought before he was in the water, his entire body submerged in the slow-moving, blissfully cool creek. The water closed around his head and he was under, panicked, looking and not seeing and when he came up for air-

She stared right back at him, treading water like she'd done it her whole life.

Jim choked, then he laughed, and soon he couldn't stop and she was giggling right along with him, her tiny stubby limbs keeping her afloat and he really should have realized the whole resemblance-to-a-shark thing wasn't a coincidence. When he straightened, he found that the water was level with his collarbone at its deepest point, and he just watched her, a little red blur, swimming like an otter through the depths.

"You're a pain in the ass," he muttered when she resurfaced again. She paddled to him, reaching out with those chubby webbed fingers, and he pulled her to him, letting her cling to his arm with surprising dexterity. He couldn't help the surge of gratitude he felt for her, as though she had any idea what she was doing. A little baby girl was holding back all the memories he'd stored away (no stay back never again forget forget keep it hidden go away no) like other children had, a long time ago.

After he retrieved her pink cloth from the bank, he decided it'd be a lot easier to just let the creek carry them along. Besides, the cool water was heaven on his back, relieving if only a little bit the searing and melting of his skin. So they drifted downstream, Jim watching the amazingly precocious alien baby while she swam- somewhat clumsily- but completely naturally.

It could have been hours later, he wasn't sure, but his fingers were pruny and his back was flaring with pain again when he heard a rustling in the brush alongside the creek. He stood immediately, stumbling over smooth stones and struggling for balance in his water-heavy uniform. He held the baby closely, covering her up with the soaked pink cloth while he stared, wide-eyed and completely on edge, at the sparse vegetation where their follower lurked.

A pair of deep golden eyes rose above the brush, and then the barrel of an old-fashioned rifle.

Jim had hardly recognized the primitive weapon for what it was before the bullet hit him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops cliffie. I'm sorry. No I'm not. I'm mean.


	3. Chapter 3

The bullet tore through his shoulder, burying itself deep amongst flesh and muscle and bone. A strangled cry was ripped from his lips and he stumbled forward, falling to his knees in the shallow water near the bank. The baby was clinging to him and he saw the figure in the brush change position, aiming again, and he held up his hand. "Wait," he gasped, feeling his flesh tear further when he jostled his shoulder.

His attacker stilled, an expectant silence falling over the brush. "Please," Jim ground out, holding his charge close as she began to cry. "I have a child, she's alone, I need to get her somewhere safe."

The barrel of the rifle disappeared from sight, and a moment later the golden eyes did as well, then the unseen attacker emerged from the forest. He was a boy, a young boy of around eleven years, with dark green skin and ridged cheek bones- a Frooliin, same as the baby. The boy watched Jim with tense suspicion, shifting weight on his large paddle-like feet.

"Do you know Standard?" Jim asked, not yet moving from his position on his knees. He knew what it was like to be eleven years old and on your own, trying to protect yourself, having to hurt people along the way- he knew, so he stayed put, blood staining his shirt and dizziness crashing over him.

The boy nodded shakily, his large, luminous eyes traveling to the wailing infant in Jim's arms. His face tightened in surprise, over what Jim couldn't tell, but he nodded again, more steadily this time. "I am sorry I shot you," the boy's voice was surprisingly deep and sonorous, it reminded Jim of Uhura's voice, and he swallowed down the lump in his throat. "My people do not take kindly to strangers."

"I've noticed," Jim grinned, hoping it didn't look too maniacal when he was sopping wet and bleeding and torn and melting. The baby's cries had tapered off into soft hiccups, and he bounced her gently in his arms as he stood uncertainly. The boy watched him, still wary, but less like a cornered animal. He wore no shirt, and Jim could see every individual rib, as well as the strange rows of pores between them.

The boy bowed in a manner that was short and curt and reminded him of another boy years ago, but the memory fled as the boy straightened again. "My name is Ruhn." He put the gun down and stepped forward, raising his hands in a non-threatening gesture when Jim flinched. The ridges on his cheekbones seemed to ripple as his nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed. "You were injured previously."

Jim stood slowly, narrowly catching himself when his knees buckled underneath him. Sweat trickled down his face and he was dizzy and nauseous, but he couldn't be sure how much of that could be attributed to the gunshot wound and how much to his burns. "My crew and I found one of your villages, completely destroyed," he choked out with some difficulty. "We investigated - that's when I found the kid - and then bombs just… just started falling."

The boy looked concerned and Jim didn't blame him, since he now appeared to have four eyes and that would be worrying for anyone. Unsteadily, the young captain stepped out of the creek and onto the sandy bank, the shifting of it underneath him making his stomach lurch. "I'm gonna collapse here in a second, Ruhn, so you'd better take the kid…"

Already large eyes widened and Ruhn took the baby in his spindly arms. "What can I-"

That was the last Jim heard before he pitched forward.

He awoke screaming, agony turning his back to fire all over again. With what meager strength he could summon he struck out, but his fist didn't connect with anything but solid ground. Jim's eyes snapped open and he found himself laying on his stomach on the forest floor, his shoulders aching like he'd been dragged, and Ruhn several feet away after likely dodging Jim's frenzied attack.

"Your body temperature is elevated far beyond what is normal for a human," Ruhn said carefully, approaching once again in a crouch. "I attempted to remove your shirt to assist in the cooling process, but the material has melded into your skin, and the infection is too advanced for it to be of much help anyway." The alien boy's lips pursed. "Your condition is quickly deteriorating."

"I've had worse," Jim muttered as he slowly pushed himself onto his hands and knees. "Thanks for not leaving me, like, passed out on the ground. That would've sucked."

"Despite your flippant attitude, it is obvious that this scenario would have distressed you deeply," the boy's disapproving golden gaze was more than a little piercing, even as he gathered up the baby to his chest. He scrutinized the strange yellow-haired captain, like he was reading a book. "You say you've had worse and you do not lie, so why deflect in such a manner?"

Jim groaned as he got to his feet unsteadily, swallowing down waves of sickness. Blood had finally stopped oozing from his shoulder, but it had stained the front of his uniform dark red that was already beginning to turn brown. "You ever hear of Vulcans, Ruhn?"

"Yes, of course," the boy replied as he stood as well. "They were very good trade partners before the destruction of their home planet."

"You would've fit right in." Jim muttered. "Alright, kid, what're you gonna do with me now?" It was strange, calling another 'kid', when all Jim had ever been was 'kid'. To Starfleet and to Bones, he was inexperienced and green and a little to exuberant for his own good. It was refreshing, assigning the title to another. And a little bit nostalgic.

"I have injured you without provocation when you had already sustained extensive damage," the young Frooliin said. "In addition, you have carried and protected one of our own though doing so offered no benefit to yourself. As such, I would be more than happy to return you to my village." He tilted his head as the captain swayed. "However, we must hurry. I do not mean to cause you distress, but it appears you are dying."

"Yeah, it's not fun," Jim muttered. "Which way's your village?"

The boy pointed downstream, the same direction Jim had been floating. "Typical," the captain sighed. "Give me the gun. I don't trust you with it."

Ruhn had the good graces to look chagrined as he handed Jim the rifle and shifted the infant in his arms. "It is not far. We will likely reach it before the moss begins to glow."

Jim grunted in reply, not sure how to respond to this tidbit of information. "Glowing moss. Right. Getting' real sick of this planet, Ruhn…"

If the boy soon became annoyed by Jim's constant rambling, he didn't give any indication. If anything, he seemed incredibly aware and respectful of his need to fill the silence. Jim must have commented on that at some point, because Ruhn answered in that infinitely patient way of his, "my people feel their emotions deeply and truly. We see no reason to hide them or to deprive others of them."

"Never mind," Jim had answered, "you wouldn't have fit in on Vulcan."

After a while he stopped talking and his feet started dragging and Ruhn was leaning into him- the poor kid must be tired, his exhausted mind rationalized. His meager psych knowledge told him he was regressing- his mind was in survival mode, slipping into the role like a long-lost glove. Now it was he leaning on someone else, a kid no less. A kid, like who he'd been back then. The irony was not lost on him.

"You have not told me your name," Ruhn said softly, and Jim truly loved that voice, and damn at that moment did he miss Uhura. She would like Ruhn and the baby. She was great with kids, he mused, and a smile tugged at his lips.

"'M name's Jim Kirk," he slurred, his lips unpleasantly numb. "'M Captain of the USS Enterprise," the body supporting him stiffened, but he didn't really notice. "'N I thought I was done wit' this sorta thing. Thought I wouldn't be hungry an'more, thought I was gettin' away, Tom, 'n then it all went'ta hell."

"Captain," Ruhn said in a voice that was gentle and soft and snapped him back to here and now not then and there, never again. "You appear to be hallucinating. Can you hear me? We should arrive at my village in twenty minutes."

"I hear ya," Jim replied, just as the baby began wailing. He was grateful for that little distraction to keep him from slipping away again, and so for the rest of the walk he was silent, just listening to the cries of the infant.

In the last ten minutes of the torturous walk, Jim noticed a strange phenomenon emanating from the forest. The shaggy moss-bark of the trees had begun to ooze light. Underneath the great sheets of the foliage covering what had to be the trunk, ribbons of light could be seen cutting through. As time passed the light got brighter, and for each tree, the light was a different hue.

Glowing moss, Jim's fever-choked mind surmised. That's really fucking weird.

It was also beautiful, he supposed, the light slicing through the monochrome gray of the world, like daggers of color fighting to bring life back to a barren land. Last night, he must had fallen asleep before the glowing took place. Then again, hadn't he felt a peculiar coolness seeping from the trees? Some sort of preliminary to the light? His head hurt.

"I don' like your planet," he told the Frooliin boy apologetically. Ruhn didn't reply, but he could swear there was a small twitch upwards of his lips. At least someone found him amusing.

The trees began to thin out and the ground began to slope upwards, slowly at first, until the boy stopped at a broad rise. Looking up, Jim could see a village resting at the crest of the hill. From where they stood, it looked remarkably like what Jim had imagined the other village to look like, before its destruction.

"This is the last leg of the journey," Ruhn said, by now holding quite a bit of Jim's weight as they hobbled along through the woods.

"'M I… they're not gonna kill me, 're they?" Jim asked, his wooziness increasing from looking up the modest height. "'Cause that would suck, gotten so far, y'know, m' crew…"

"They will not kill you, Captain," the Frooliin boy said as they walked slowly up the hill. The hill was in fact more of a small plateau, but the village used the softest of the sides as a means to reach their encampment, giving the impression of a rounder shape than it actually possessed. The village was situated high enough that one could easily see the broad creek's course as it wrapped around the base of the plateau and disappeared into the silver woods. Had Jim been a bit more coherent he would have marveled at the beautiful placement of a village for a people who were obviously semi-aquatic.

"You said you don' like strangers," the young captain protested, trying to distract himself from the laborious climb and the aching of his shoulder and back.

"No, but we are quite fond of heroes," said the boy softly, and instantly Jim's mind was overrun with confusion. Not a hero not a hero not a hero, voices from long ago, from that time? No, from before then. He lived to prove those voices wrong but they were right this time, he hadn't done anything, hadn't saved anyone, not a hero-

The baby cried out just as the weary band crested the plateau and entered the open circle of the village.

A Frooliin with dark blue skin emerged from one of the houses. He gasped upon seeing the captain and ducked back inside the house, only to emerge a moment later with an orange-skinned female in tow. They approached just as Jim's head spun and the world began to tilt and suddenly he was headed straight to the ground when a pair of strong arms caught him.

"Relax," said a soft voice somewhere in the distance, not from the person holding him, but from the brave boy who supported him. "You say you've had worse and you do not lie, but you are not alone this time. Let us help."

Jim let the world go black.

The strange man went still in her arms, all the strength draining out of his long, wiry body. His skin was hot to the touch, and the sight of his back was enough to make her gasp in sympathy. "Irin," she ordered the blue-skinned man to her left. "Carry him inside. Tell Juuir and Homna to fetch me bandages, hot water, and that human anatomy handbook. Be quick." The man nodded as he hefted the human's body into his arms and carried him as quickly as possible to their house.

She turned to Ruhn, who held a baby in his arms, one of their own kind. Brave, sensitive, reckless Ruhn, her youngest son, the healer-after-her. Quickly she embraced him, pressing her lips to his hairline. "You have done well, Ruhn, and I am proud to call you son," the healer whispered.

Ruhn smiled in that soft way of his. "Your pride fills me with happiness, Frunize."

Frunize pulled, resting one hand on his raven-black hair. "Take the baby to Chenla, then come assist. I will begin healing the stranger immediately." Her son nodded shortly and ducked away with the red-skinned baby in his arms, toward the house across from their own.

Upon entering her own stone house again, Frunize was please to find her mate, Irin, had already set out the soft grass mat and had lain the stranger down on his stomach, the couch drawn away to make room for Frunize's healing. Her pouch was set out in front of the man's prone form, full of her herbs and bandages she'd collected over the years. The back door could be heard and in came Juuir, her oldest son, hefting a bucket of boiled water, and then Homna, her daughter, with the old handbook she'd never had to use.

Without a word Frunize kneeled at the mat in the center of the room, doing nothing, simply observing. The wounds across the man's back were horrific. The burns glistened wetly, deep red and white-lipped, scorched flakes of black skin dangling from thin strips of viable flesh. In some areas his shirt melded into the skin, long fingers of golden fabric slipping into moist wounds, digging down into flesh and musculature.

The infection had made the flesh swell grotesquely, diseased skin around the burns puffy and hot and oozing a pale yellow liquid, leaving very little skin on the back unmarked. She stroked the man's golden hair back, seeing his eyebrows twitch as the movement disturbed him. Sympathy ran deep within her for the young man.

Ruhn dropped to his knees beside her. "The stranger's name is Jim Kirk, Captain of the USS Enterprise." Startled by this information, Frunize looked up, but Ruhn continued. "I was out hunting. I found the stranger in the creek. Startled, I shot him, before he had a chance to speak for himself," her son bowed his head. "He had rescued the baby from a collapsed village before it was bombed. The rest of his crew appears to be gone."

"You should not have attacked a man who was alone and scared," Frunize admonished gently. "This man tries to hide, but he does not know how we read one another. You should have seen." The boy looked crestfallen, but his mother pressed on. "That being said, you were scared as well. You are but a child, but you acted as an adult when you brought him back to us. My pride has not diminished."

Ruhn nodded, and he was her soft son again, sensitive even for their kind, caring and warm. "He deeply fears this place. It awakens something for him. Something from long ago."

The healer nodded, flipping open the book of human anatomy to see where she should begin in what would be a painstakingly long process. "His burns hide his scars. I believe that is what humans call 'irony'."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So every chapter is already written up to chapter nine, and I'll be uploading once a day or so. Remember to comment!


	4. Chapter 4

There were no painkillers that Frunize could give the stranger.

The knowledge, once found in the handbook, filled her with a terrible sympathy for the man under her care. All of the plants listed as being safe for human consumption in the event of injury had gone extinct since the dramatic change in climate had shaken the planet. There was nothing she could do to ease his suffering while she utilized her magic.

Deep in her heart, she felt as though she'd failed the man in some irreversible way. As a Frooliin, and one trained to be a healer at that, she'd learned never to doubt her emotions. Empathy was at the root of who she was, and so she somehow knew that what she was about to do was the cruelest thing she could do to the man. She didn't know why or how, but she felt it all the same.

They tied him down before she began. Tied his wrists and ankles and bound them to long wood poles, which Frunize's family sat upon to keep him as still possible. It was primitive and crude and so, so cruel a thing to do to a man so scarred, so terrified of helplessness.

"He will not forgive you," Ruhn spoke up, sitting across from her on the man's other side. It wasn't an accusation, just a simple stating of fact.

Frunize pulled from her bag of supplies a pair of small, fire-hardened forceps. She had to remove the stranger's shirt before she could begin the healing process. To say she was dreading it would be an understatement. "But he will forgive you," she said, knowing her son's true concern without looking at him.

The boy nodded, because as much as he played at being a man, one was never too old for reassuring from a kind mother. She handed him a knife and he deftly began to cut away the man's filthy shirt, working quickly and drawing only a few strangled moans from the captain.

When all that was left was the fabric sticking to the open burns, Frunize handed Ruhn another pair of forceps. "Be quick," she told him quietly, surely, "do not waste time trying to be gentle. To do so would prolong his pain." Turning to her mate and her other children who would be holding down their patient, she nodded grimly. "Keep him as still as you can. He is weakened, but panic will strengthen him."

One by one the family made their understanding known and held steady their positions. Frunize and Ruhn looked at one another. Then they began.

_______________________________________________

"Will you hurt them?"

His arms ached and cold metal was digging into his wrists. His voice was hoarse and broken and so young and he didn't want to be like this, didn't want to be helpless. He looked up and tried to muster all the strength he could in his eyes, the eyes his mother couldn't look at, the eyes Frank so despised. Eyes were powerful- they could cut someone down and pierce through them and shatter any and all faith they had in themselves. He knew that firsthand.

The man's smile was wolfish. It made Jim shiver, made him wish he was bigger and stronger and not so fucking scared. "I don't go back on my word, James." His hand, large and spindly and rough, dragged across Jim's shoulder blades as he walked behind him. "They'll die without you, anyway. I have no reason to harm them."

Jim wanted to throw up as that hand kept tracing him, caressing him, testing thin, spindly arms, pressing against sore muscles and counting every sharp rib. "What do you want me to do?" He ground out, like he had any control, like his ankles weren't shackled to the floor and his wrists to the ceiling.

A thoughtful hum came from the man as he poked at Jim's ribs, at his constantly roiling stomach. "Nothing yet. You're not ready." Jim's skin was cold and thin, and the man's hands seemed to burn against him. "I don't want your cooperation, James. I want your loyalty."

Fuck you, Jim screamed in his head. Tears stung his eyes suddenly and he had to fight to hold them back when just hours before he'd been resigned, completely committed to his fate. Fuck you, you murderer, you goddamn monster, you killed my family, he was quaking in rage, too blinded by tears and fury to notice the man had stepped away from him, disappearing into the shadows of the tiny, cramped dungeon.

"Eventually, your anger will be useful," the man said as he stepped aside from the door, allowing two large, burly goons into the cell. "But for now you pose a threat to yourself and to the future of this colony." He spoke now to the guards in a cold, neutral tone. "No permanent damage. Just make it painful."

The door clanged shut, and Jim was left alone with the two goons standing behind him. He heard the sound of a belt coming unwound, and he almost laughed. Like he hadn't seen this before. Like this wasn't a weekly occurrence back home. He evened out his breathing, held on, prepared to ride it out-

It turned out the guard's arm was a lot stronger than Frank's.

_________________________________________

Jim awoke suddenly.

His powerful body thrashed just as Frunize peeled from his back a long, bloody strip of cloth. Not a sound was drawn from his mouth, and somehow that was more alarming then his screaming would have been. Instead he twisted and struggled, and when he realized his arms and legs were bound, he went completely still.

Both Frunize and Ruhn paused what they were doing. They were almost done with the bloody task of cleaning the man's back and trying their best to ignore the heart wrenching noises he made whenever a particularly painful piece of debris was removed. Ruhn caught his mother's gaze for a moment, conveying in that single glance all the dread in the world.

The captain's face was turned toward Frunize, and slowly his ice-blue eyes drifted to find her face. His skin was ashen and his entire body heaved with each unsteady breath he took, and desperately, he tried once more to free his left arm. When it held fast from the two grown Frooliins currently holding it down, he closed his eyes and swallowed convulsively.

"Jim," Ruhn whispered, moving gingerly to the man's other side. His eyes opened again, and he looked at the boy, but his body did not relax. Ruhn reached out with one slender green hand, but pulled it back when the man flinched violently. Pity glowed in his golden eyes for a moment before he steeled his resolve and tried again, this time ignoring the flinch and resting his hand on the captain's pale face. "My mother and I are trying to remove the remaining fabric from your wounds before we can begin healing you. I know you are scared, but you must relax."

For a long moment Jim gave no indication that he'd heard. Then, finally, he nodded, unconsciously leaning a bit into the cool hand on his burning cheek. "Just… please, tell them to let me go, Ruhn," he muttered, his voice hoarse and tight. "I won't move, I promise. Please." The last word was barely audible, and was somehow that much more heartrending because of it.

Ruhn looked to his mother, who nodded after a brief pause. Quickly the boy went about untying the captain's wrists and ankles, watching more tension leave his body after each knot came undone. Finally he was free of the restraints, and Jim lie still, his breathing evening out.

"We must proceed now, Captain," Frunize spoke up once her son had taken his place again. "This will be painful, and I advise you to lose consciousness again as soon as possible."

That got a choked laugh out of the young man. "I'll do my best," he answered with a thin veneer of humor in his voice. Frunize wasn't sure whether she admired that or thought it foolish. Both, if she was honest with herself.

Just as she was lowering the forceps to begin again, Jim's slightly panicked voice stopped her. "Wait, the baby. Is she okay?"

Frunize smiled indulgently at the man. "The child is safe, Captain," she said softly. "You saved her, and my people will be sure she knows your name as she grows." Still he looked unsure, like he couldn't quite believe he'd succeeded. "Jim," his eyes danced up to hers, so strange and small and blue compared to her own. "You have fulfilled your duty, and you have done so splendidly. Allow yourself to surrender, if only for a little while. No harm will come to you or to the one you carried."

He swallowed hard, and finally, finally, he nodded.

Frunize looked to the rest of her family, now not needed with the ropes unbound from their patient. As one they stood and left the room, all knowing without needing to be told that the stranger would not appreciate their being privy to his treatment.

After that, the removal of the debris was rather uneventful. The captain was unnervingly quiet through the ordeal, his eyes screwed shut and his fists curled whitely at his sides. Occasionally a grunt escaped his tight control or a sudden jerk shook his frame, but mostly he bore the pain in a stoic manner that was disturbing to the Frooliins, who valued the expression of emotion and sensation.

When finally the wounds were clean, Frunize used a cloth to wipe the sweat and grime from Jim's pale face. The fever was still scorching his skin and making him tremble and gasp in relief when a cold hand touched him, but she knew he would never admit to the discomfort plaguing him. "We will now begin the healing process," she told him. Remembering that he responded well to humor, she continued, "though you did not take my advice earlier that you lose consciousness, I strongly urge you to rethink it."

Jim huffed another breathless laugh, and Ruhn looked at his mother gratefully, aware as she was now of his peculiar preference for deflection. "The treatment involves the regeneration of damaged and absent cells, basically finding where there is a fragment and making it whole again," Ruhn explained. "We have painkillers for our own kind, but none are safe for use on humans."

"Whatever you have to do," the captain answered with an exhausted but sincere grin. "You guys are saving my life. I'm not exactly going to complain about your methods."

"Unless they involve detaining you," Frunize mused, not masking the confusion, showing it freely as all her kind did. Ruhn, dear, sensitive Ruhn, looked at her sternly, like one might at a child who was still learning the difference between honesty and cruelty. Hastily, she attempted to backtrack. "You bear physical pain like a Vulcan, yet other sensations you find unbearable? I apologize, I do not mean to… pry, I suppose. Your people value privacy in a way mine do not. I merely wish to understand your discomfort." She stopped speaking when she realized she'd been rambling, and a quick glance at Ruhn told her that the explanation hadn't helped anything.

"It's alright," Jim said, though all the levity in his voice was gone, replaced by a hollow detachment that reflected in his shuttered blue eyes. "Just don't like being tied down, that's all." There was a long silence, in which it was obvious the captain was looking for some way to explain his reactions. "Humans… we, if something happens to us, something painful or difficult or embarrassing, we don't… we don't like to talk about it, or share it at all."

The young man's fists clenched spasmodically, knowing the alien woman still didn't understand. "It's not healthy, to not talk about it, but… the pain, the memories, it all comes to the surface and," he stopped, then pressed on, they're helping you don't let them down you owe them this they'll keep the baby safe quit being stupid, "some of us are just… weaker than others. And we never deal with those things that happen because we're scared. Scared to look at our mistakes or to relive it or whatever, and in the end, it's just easier to, to…"

"To pretend you're okay," Ruhn spoke up, to which Jim nodded. He said nothing more, and both Frooliins knew that was the most they'd be getting out of him, at least for the moment. "We will begin healing you now," Ruhn said as his mother began mixing crushed herbs in her cupped hands, herbs that would be sprinkled directly over the wounds and left to dissolve into the skin over the course of an hour.

This time, Jim wasn't silent, and when his half-choked whimpers and aborted moans finally tapered off, Frunize was just glad he'd taken her advice.

_____________________________________________________________

Sometimes they let him sit on the floor, his arms still bound but now allowed to rest at his sides. He knew they did it just so he wouldn't lose the use of his arms, but he still felt a sick sense of gratitude whenever they let him rest, if only for an hour at a time.

Then they would string him back up again, like he was wildfowl left to cook over a fire. They'd beat him or they'd whip him or they'd slice him open or do anything and everything, really- they just wanted to make him scream, most days. Others days they wanted him to cry. Those were the worst.

Those were the days he came back.

He'd laugh and he'd prod and he'd taunt, he'd mock all of Jim's efforts- useless stupid should have known better honestly I thought you were better than this I can make you better no never mind you're not worth it- and he'd remind him that his family is dead. His friends will be dead soon, too, and then what will he do? Where will that leave him? Poor, broken James, never even had a chance, fought so hard, got nowhere, served him right for fighting the inevitable.

Some days Jim believes his taunts and he begs- begs for what, he doesn't know. Mercy or food or death, or just not to be left alone in the chamber like he is every night. The man will laugh and tell him how pathetic he is, like he didn't know that already, like that wasn't so obvious from the very first time Frank hit him, like that wasn't the story of his life.

Then he'll leave and Jim would be all alone again, in the dark and the cold and praying to a God he stopped believing in a long time ago.

A week after they first tied him up he finally learns why the man wants him. He's a tool, a weapon, he'll be broken and molded and fixed again into something new, something that can be used to hunt down all who ran away, all who escaped. They'll trust him because he's Jim Kirk and he's the bravest boy they've ever known and they'll never suspect, not for a second, that he's just a pawn.

Two weeks after they first tied him up and Jim wants to die. He tells the man so, but he laughs in his face and continues breaking each of his fingers and toes. His fingernails have already been torn out. His legs have been snapped, but they have some sort of primitive regenerator here that's healed them twice over so they could be broken all over again.

Three weeks after they first tied him up, betraying his friends is starting to seem like a pretty good option. They've branded him, on his left thigh, and the stench of his flesh burning and the feeling of it boiling and sizzling has him openly sobbing because his family burned too, and it was only fitting.

Four weeks after they first tied him up, he no longer makes a sound. He just stares.

Five weeks after they first tied him up, Jim Kirk is the perfect soldier.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Jim's eyes blinked open slowly, feeling sticky and uncooperative.

A green-skinned Frooliin woman knelt at his side, holding in her arms a soft bundle of blankets cradling the baby. She removed her hand from his shoulder, which no longer stung unbearably from the bullet wound. The woman smiled down at him with sharp, triangle-shaped teeth. "Hello, Jim. My name is Chenla."

He tried to voice a greeting, but it came out as more of a garbled grunt. The woman's appearance was surprising- she didn't look like Ruhn's mother, Frunize, or the other woman who was in the room at the beginning of his treatment- Ruhn's sister, he suspected. Both those women were sleek and wiry, in fact looking nearly identical to the men as far as build went. The only real difference was the men's broader shoulders. It was only instinct that allowed him to sort them into male and female.

Chenla, however, was similar to a human woman- curvy, with broad hips and full breasts, obviously a mother to her own children. "Ruhn came to me when your treatment had finished. He said you would appreciate seeing the baby. Is that true?"

Before he really knew what he was doing, Jim was nodding, the side of his face rubbing against the soft grass mat. A yearning awoke in him to affirm the continued existence of his small charge, and it was that yearning which propelled him to roll on his side and hold out his arms for the baby.

Chenla slipped the tiny, warm bundle into his arms, and immediately the tight knot of anxiety in his chest slipped away as he took in the sight of freshly washed red skin and huge, healthy-looking golden eyes. He smiled as he hugged the baby close, and she smiled in return with all those little pin-sharp teeth. "Thank you," he whispered to the woman, pressing his forehead to the baby's temple.

The woman smiled. "The female equivalent of your name is Jamie, correct?"

Jim looked up, somewhat startled, having somehow forgotten about the existence of any other life forms. "Yeah, that's be right."

Chenla nodded as she stood gracefully. "Go back to sleep, Jim. You need to rest and recover. Our leader will talk to you when you have regained your strength." With that, she turned away, and she exited the small hut with only a single, fond glance back at the two strangers.

Jim wrapped his arms around the baby's soft warmth, feeling her steady puffs of breath against his cheek. Within moments both were asleep.


	5. Chapter 5

"I'm still getting used to the idea that you're not going to die," Jim told the baby in his arms. He wasn't sure how long he'd been awake, or how long he'd slept. The only light in the room was a solitary candle flickering at his bedside, illuminating the homey setting in a warm glow.

The infant stared back at him, raising her chubby little arms to poke at his cheeks and nose and mouth. The smile that came to his lips was slow. His mind felt murky and lethargic, like waking up from being drugged, and his entire body ached so badly he was almost unable to move. "I keep thinking," he continued speaking to the baby, the words staggering on his sluggish tongue, "and I hate myself for it… but I can't stop thinking, how come you get to live?"

He swallowed hard, aware of how bad that sounded and wanting to amend it even though the baby didn't understand a word he was saying. "Don't get me wrong, I'm happy you get to live, but why you? Huh? What about my other kids?" Unbidden, tears had begun to well up in his eyes, and he blinked harshly to force them away. "What about Mara and Joss and Ki'one?" There was no anger in him, no resentment, not towards her, but still he spat the furious words while she stared at him, eyes forgiving and golden.

Jim took in a shuddering breath, closing his eyes to rein in his emotions. "How come you're the only baby I get to save?" He pulled her closer, pressing their foreheads together, convincing himself she was alive and breathing and safe. She giggled and touched his face, and a small smile peeked through his heavy haze of despair. "I think Ruhn gave me something," he muttered conspiratorially. "These mood swings are weird as fuck."

Just then the door to the little house opened, and in stepped the green-skinned Frooliin woman from earlier. Jim grinned from his spot on the grass mat and achingly raised one arm to wave at her. "Hey! Chenla, right? I feel drugged. Am I drugged?"

Chenla smiled in return as she stepped around the room's sparse furniture to kneel beside the captain and his small charge. With that instinctive motherly nature Jim had pegged from the moment he saw her, the Frooliin woman reached out and brushed the hair back from his forehead with one six-fingered hand. He watched her somewhat warily, his jovial mood having dissipated as suddenly as his misery. Her sympathetic smile irritated him a bit, and wow, he needed to calm the fuck down. "The herbs used to heal your wounds will cause your emotions to be in turmoil for several hours more."

The young man groaned in exasperation, and tried to sit up. 'Tried' being the operative word. As it turned out, his back muscles not only ached; they seemed to be completely uninspired to move. "And why the hell can't I move? This isn't fun. I am not having fun. At all."

Hard as she tried to hide her amusement, Chenla found the captain's childish indignation worthy of a laugh, to which he answered with an accusatory glare. "This is not a joke, shark lady. Why did I say that. That was really mean, and you don't even know what a shark is. Jesus…"

"The herbs also cause minor, temporary delirium." Chenla answered, not particularly offended by his remarks. "Like your emotions, it will resolve itself in a matter of hours. As for your inability to move, I'd say it's a sympathetic reaction to all the strain you've put yourself through the past couple of days."

"I don't like not being able to move." Jim insisted, distressed confusion on his face. "It's weird and I want a refund on my existence now, please."

"And yet your wit continues to serve you," Chenla teased gently. She had a leather pouch slung over her shoulder, which she now removed. She stood to walk towards the other end of the room, where a variety of foreign-looking supplies were stored. "I assume you are thirsty, Captain. You've been unconscious for nearly twelve hours."

Jim hummed an affirmative, distracted by the baby in his arms who had decided her caretaker wasn't giving her enough attention. He didn't even notice when Chenla returned with a small wooden bowl and sat next to him again. Slowly, she helped him sit up and lean against the wall of the stone building, not commenting on his pained groans when his muscles protested the movement.

When he was settled with the baby in his lap, Chenla began to fill the bowl with water from the pouch. "You got any kids?" Jim asked, his voice only somewhat breathless from his brief ordeal.

She grinned proudly, raising the bowl to the young man's lips so he could drink. "I have a boy, somewhat older than your little one. He is a riin-kor, a yellow-skinned." The woman bowed her head somewhat shyly, "my mate and I are proud to call him son."

Jim drank the contents of the bowl in slow, even gulps, feeling it soothe his aching throat. When it was lowered from his lips, he nodded in gratitude. "I bet you're a good mom," he smiled goofily, forgetting again that his inhibitions needed to be kept under tight control at the moment. "You seem like a good mom. He's gonna be real grateful for that one day, and if he's not, you should kick his ass."

For some reason her smile was sad now. Jim scowled, chafing under the searching gaze. Seeing his irritation, she looked away, settling herself more comfortably on the ground. "Are you grateful for your mother?"

"Did the best she could," Jim answered without thinking. His eyes were stinging again. There was no way he wasn't drugged. "I just kind of wish she never bothered."

Chenla wanted to press, that much was obvious. She wanted to pick him apart and glue him back together and do the whole sharing-and-caring thing this entire race was so obsessed with.

Luckily, she didn't say another word about it. Instead they sat and talked for hours, about the planet's climate and Chenla's family and Jim's family. Jim's crew, actually, but Chenla took the liberty of reading between the lines. It was warm and nice and as time went on Jim felt his fragile emotional walls building again, stabilizing even as his thought process cleared.

Eventually the door opened again, letting in Ruhn and Frunize, as well as a pleasant gust of warm air. Seeing Frunize sent a small trill of anxiety through him, sprouting from the memory of being tied down, of being helpless. He squashed down the emotion as quickly as it came and grinned, because no matter what he felt towards the kid's mother, he truly was glad to see Ruhn.

The orange-skinned woman stopped several feet away while Ruhn approached, obviously sensing Jim's discomfort. She smiled in a way she hoped was non-threatening, not showing any of her sharp teeth. "The yijuuf, our leader, wishes to speak with you and your little one."

"Sure thing," he shifted, then went still as agony laced up and down his spine. "I might need some help up, though," he went on in a strained voice.

Frunize stepped forward to take the baby from his arms, but on impulse he jerked back, staring with wide eyes at the six-fingered hands outstretched for his charge. Silence was a poignant presence in the room as Frunize lowered her arms and stepped away, his ice-blue gaze following her with a predatory malice that, upon closer examination, was nothing more that fierce protectiveness. "Jim," Ruhn murmured, not flinching when the young man's head snapped around to fix the boy in that penetrating gaze. "I'll take your baby. Please trust me."

Your baby, he'd said. Jim repeated it in his mind over and over, unspeakably grateful that Ruhn had known exactly what he needed to hear. The child was his responsibility, and she would be returned to him, no harm done. He handed her off with some degree of shaking in his arms, then the two women helped him to his feet. A small flinch was his only reaction when Frunize touched him, and she didn't comment on it.

When finally he was steady on his feet, Ruhn handed him the infant again, who he cradled to his bare chest like he hadn't last had her just moments before. Frunize kept him straight with a hand on his bicep as she led him out the door of the stone house, into the large circle around which the other houses were located. A huge, unlit fire pit was located at the center, around which four children chased one another and laughed in high, clear voices.

Seeing the stranger emerge from their healer's house, all four children looked up and stared with huge golden eyes. Two were violet-skinned, one was yellow, and one was green, like Ruhn and Chenla. The violet girl was the one who approached them, stopping in front of Jim and staring at him with unabashed curiosity. She looked at Frunize then, and spoke in her best serious-adult voice. "The yijuuf is expecting him. I will be his escort."

Jim grinned in response, finding that he quite liked the serious little girl. Frunize let go of his arm and the girl grasped his hand in her own, leading him to the north end of the circle. Jim glanced back, seeing Ruhn looking mildly concerned and Chenla laughing. Apparently this was common behavior from the girl.

"My name is Krell," the girl told him as she dragged him along to the largest of the buildings, sitting at the apex of the broad circle, towering over the others with its cloud-obscured spires. "The yijuuf is my sister, meaning I will lead after her," Krell went on determinedly as they reached the great stone door. She stomped on the ground and the doors slid open with a terrible grinding screech. The girl did a strange sort of salute, then stood stock-still, like she was guarding the doors. "Enter now."

"Thank you," he said gratefully, as though he would never have been able to find the building on his own. She lifted her chin proudly and he smiled before stepping into the cavernous room. The doors grinded shut behind him, leaving him standing alone in the middle of the cathedral-like room.

It was perfectly round, candles burning in various colors placed intermittently around the edge. The bright flames licked at the smooth stone walls, reaching up and casting light over the high, vaulted ceiling, making carved scriptures stand out in stark relief. Other than the candles, the room was empty, save for the woman who stood in the center, smiling widely at him. For being the tribe's leader, she seemed very unremarkable, just a young woman, no older than eighteen, with skin that was red like the baby's.

She smiled, and in that moment Jim felt terrible for ever thinking she looked ordinary, because that smile completely transformed her. From a vaguely pretty young Frooliin, that smiled changed her into a powerful, glowing goddess, a benevolent leader, a graceful and celebrated queen. Her entire face was lit from within, glowing like a sun this planet hadn't seen in far too long.

The woman stepped forward, her loose pants swaying around her legs. Like the other women besides Chenla, her body was incredibly androgynous, slim and lithe with no breasts or other indicators of her gender, only her somewhat slimmer shoulders. "Jim Kirk, captain of the USS Enterprise," she spoke softly, her long black hair catching candlelight. "I am Zlinzee, the yijuuf of this tribe. I am glad you have awakened."

The woman sank to the ground and Jim followed suit, scooting forward at the wave of her hand. They sat several feet apart and she simply stared, unblinking, her legs crossed underneath her in a way that was strangely childlike. She tilted her head to the side, making her hair fall in a cascade down her shoulder. Jim's gaze followed it down her bare chest, to where her ribs stood out clearly between lines of small pores. The other Frooliins he'd seen had looked the same- he deeply hoped the emaciated appearance was simply part of their physiology.

For several moments more she studied him candidly. It spoke wonders of the affect these people were having on him that he didn't feel at all uncomfortable under her scrutiny, at least not until she looked at the baby. "May I see the infant?" She asked with something akin to nervousness in her voice. "Please forgive my uncertainty; I have had little experience with babies since Krell was very young."

Carefully he held the baby out and was rewarded with Zlinzee's ground-moving smile. She took her in her long arms, carefully cradling her head with one hand as she observed the infant. Their skin was the same shade of deep crimson red; briefly, Jim wondered if the skin color was genetic. It didn't seem likely, since none of Frunize's children shared her orange skin. In fact, none of the Frooliin he knew to be related had the same skin color.

"Your little one is strong," the yijuuf said with a smile. "I assume Chenla has told you of my decision?"

Immediately, Jim tensed. "What decision?"

Sensing how the ominous ring of her words did not bode well with the young captain, Zlinzee gave him a reassuring smile. "Do not fear, Captain," she said. "I merely meant my decision to name the child Jamie, after her intrepid father."

Blood rose to Jim's cheeks, and he felt somewhat dizzy with shock and embarrassment. "Um, no, I'm not her father-"

The woman tilted her head, a softer smile playing on her lips. "Are you not?" There was a teasing note in her voice, and it was familiar, subtle but there all the same- it reminded him of Spock. "Men often claim the right to fatherhood simply for impregnating a woman. You risked your life to keep this child safe. You are more her father than most could hope for."

His throat felt weird and tight, so his emotions probably weren't as stable as he'd thought they were. Dammit, Ruhn. "Okay," he choked, then tried again. "Okay. Jamie."


	6. Chapter 6

It was moments like these that McCoy wished the Enterprise had those old-fashioned doors on hinges so he could make his entrance that much more impactful. Instead he had to settle for the gentle swoosh of the doors as he stormed onto the bridge, Spock just behind him. "Turn around," he snarled to Sulu, who swiveled around in the captain's chair. He stood and stepped away, allowing for Spock to take his position. "There's nothing I can do, Doctor," Sulu said, taking his customary place at the helm.

"Bullshit," McCoy had to fight to keep his voice in check, hardly able to hear it over the pounding of panicked blood in his ears. Spock was as cool and collected as ever, lowering himself into the captain's chair and steadfastly ignoring the doctor's rant. The reports came flying in from all stations- speculations on the attackers' identities, unfamiliar communication frequencies, strange weapon technology- Jim's crew, moving in a wild, unscripted dance as they all tried to ascertain an answer.

But there was no quicksilver gaze, no impulsive mind here to interpret and make a slapdash decision. There was only Spock, unfazed, steady, a glacier where there should have been starfire.

McCoy was at the chair in an instant, spinning it around so Spock was facing him, one acrobatic eyebrow arched gracefully. The rampant commotion on the bridge grinded to a stop, eyes not currently focused on maintaining warp paying rapt attention to the developing altercation. The doctor placed his hands on the armrests, leaning forward and glaring deeply into the Vulcan's oh-so-human eyes. This close up, they're mirrors, calculating and observing but ultimately reflecting, bringing him no closer to the answers he sought. "Spock. Turn around."

Something flashed across Spock's face then, something that made him look old and so very, very young. In a split second it was gone, leaving his face like a plane of glass, unbearably smooth. "As Lieutenant Sulu said, Doctor McCoy, there is nothing I can do." There's a smudge of soot across his cheek, and his usually immaculate bangs are slightly askew- it's more disturbing than it should be. "It is a choice between our captain and the entire crew of the Enterprise. The needs of the many are greater than-"

"Don't give me that shit!" McCoy snarled, a muscle in his jaw jumping, his teeth grinding audibly, red burning across his face and neck, rage leaping to the delicate capillaries underneath his skin. "You mean to tell me you are willing to leave Jim Kirk, your best friend, alone and bleeding and under attack on an alien planet?!"

Tension was palpable in the air, the steady beeping of machinery hardly a comfort when not a soul was speaking. Some shifted uncomfortably, some stared with bated breath, some pointedly ignored the battle of wills. All around, hands clenched onto nearby objects, holding on for dear life, this chaos so unlike the kind they'd all become accustomed to.

The doctor's breath is coming hot and heavy across Spock's face and he can see the tremors now, quaking in his broad shoulders. The science officer opened his mouth to reply, but he stopped himself, looked away, a convulsive swallow shivering down his throat. "The captain ordered it," his voice is soft, too soft for the rest of the bridge crew to hear. "I could not refuse him, Doctor, and I know for a fact you would not have been able to, either."

For several moments more McCoy stared at him, a new shininess in his heavily lined eyes. He nodded jerkily, moistened his lips, and stood up in a manner that was stiff beyond his years. Without another word he left the bridge, leaving Spock to stare after him, still facing where the doctor had stood a moment before. "Commander Spock," Uhura spoke from her post, her deep, sonorous voice resonating like a drum over the bridge, "the enemy spacecraft is no longer pursuing us."

Slowly Spock rotated back around, facing the great expanse of blurring stars as they hurdled through space. He was surprised by Uhura's use of the word 'enemy' when referring to the unfamiliar spaceship; usually his lover was friendly, verging on complacent, when it came to alien life. But in this case he agreed. The beings who made him turn his back on his captain were scum of the galaxy. "Thank you, Lieutenant Uhura. Open up communications with Admiral Archer."

____________________________________________

"What happened to my crew?" Jim asked, some thirty minutes into his conversation with Zlinzee. Over the course of their short discussion, he'd found himself becoming more and more enthralled with the alien woman's easy, light-hearted charm and grace. She guided the conversation firmly but gently, steering him through the events that had occurred while he'd been unconscious. But the question burning within him would not be content to smolder any longer, and it came out somewhat harsher than he'd intended.

Zlinzee looked sympathetic, enough so that Jim felt panic rise in his chest. But she pressed on quickly, easing his growing dread with a placating murmur of, "they are safe, Jim, as long as they left orbit."

Jim swallowed hard, looking away from the woman's searching gaze. "Who attacked them, and why? We had permission to investigate your planet- we were here on a peaceful mission, we had no intention of-"

"I know you meant no harm, Captain," Zlinzee assured him, "and all will be explained, I promise you. But-" She cut herself off, presumably seeing something on the captain's face that made a bone-deep sadness flit across her own. "I should not keep these secrets from you, should I?"

Confused, he shook his head, not sure what exactly the yijuuf had seen.

"I will not toy with your trust," her voice was very low and very solemn, intimidating in its sincerity. He nearly flinched away from the force of her gaze, accentuated by her rapidly dilating pupils and the rippling of her ridged cheekbones. "I only hope that those who have done so before me paid dearly."

If his nod is a little shaky, his smile a little broken, she doesn't comment on it. Instead she launches into her explanation and he is dragged along with her, down the histories of the lives around him, condensed and sapped of tragedy and love, left with only the most barren, clinical essence. It was heartbreaking, and it was exhausting, but Jim kept up.

"Long ago, when my grandfather ruled, a woman arrived on our planet. A human, like yourself, with her own crew. She was benevolent, and strong, and wiser than even our oldest, our most sensitive. My grandfather welcomed her, as was tradition, and she in turn shared tales of the stars and space." The yijuuf smiled wistfully, and Jim imagined her as a child, listening intently to the same story he was now being told.

"During this time, our people did not live in small, isolated tribes, as they do now. We lived in large villages, each governed by chosen bloodlines. The woman taught us the value of character, how to choose leaders based not on heritage but on characteristics needed to keep us safe." Seeing Jim's skeptical look, her lips twitched. "She was not part of your Federation, Captain. She called herself a pirate. To this day, that word is nearly synonymous with 'hero.'

"The woman was good and brave, but she was idealistic, and somewhat naïve. In the midst of her crew was an evil man who spread doubt where she spread hope. He said the things she taught our people were unholy, said the stars held more danger than they did opportunity. He uprooted her, so discreetly nobody saw it coming, until my grandfather found her one morning with ten knives lodged in her chest.

"The evil man took control. He pitted the villages against one another, made them divide more and more until they were broken tribes. He fed them lies until the people all looked to him as the one supreme wisdom, never once questioned his motives. Unlike the good woman, who wanted only to see and feel and experience, the evil man wanted to own. He wanted the world at his feet, wanted adoration and devotion. The man was a foolish god, and he soon found his end.

"My grandfather had loved the woman desperately, and that desperation turned to rage after her death. He bided his time, waiting until the man thought he could trust him, and stabbed him through the heart, just as the woman had been killed. My grandfather told the people that the man told the truth; the stars were too dangerous. He cut off any communication with life outside our planet, for he had grown cold and distrustful of outsiders.

"His distrust was mirrored in the people, who stayed isolated and peaceful, never questioning what history had told them. They would always remember the foolish god who abused their trust and set fire to those who did not follow his footsteps. But some clung to the memory of the good woman, and they recognized that the stars held both good and evil." At this point, Zlinzee looked away, candlelight casting shadows over her cheekbones and making her seem much older.

"My older brother, as a child, was very brave and very strong. He wanted very badly to someday become yijuuf of our tribe. But there was something… dark about him. He yearned deeply for the stars, but not in the way you do, Captain. Like the foolish god, he wished only to own, to conquer and enslave. It soon became clear, when he began hiding his feelings, just how dark he had become. When I was chosen to become the next yijuuf, my brother left us. We have not seen him since."

The silence was nearly deafening now as Zlinzee stared at something only she could see, her eyes misted over, a slight tightening in her jaw. Candlelight jumped across her red skin, and she looked like fire, but still she sounded as cool as the river. "Ruhn believes Janin, my dear brother, is the cause of all this."

Jim shook his head. "You can't know that."

Zlinzee looked at him sharply, and now she was fire, leaping through her eyes and over her skin and into Jim's soul, scorching everything. "Your crew was not given permission to come here, Jim. My people are still too afraid to ever give the Federation direct landing privileges on our planet. There is a bigger force at work here. My people are not advanced- we prefer to live simply."

"So Ruhn thinks your brother is getting help from another alien race," Jim murmured, the pieces falling into place. "And they're the ones who chased my crew off? But who called us here to begin with?"

"Someone asking for help," Zlinzee answered coldly, with clenched fists and darkly dancing eyes. "Someone who was likely then silenced, like all the rest. Ruhn believes the tribes being bombed are the ones who do not agree with Janin's ideals."

Jim stared forward blankly at some point past the woman's head, his wildfire mind running over the situation and coming to the same conclusion. "That's an awful lot of faith to put into a kid," he muttered, if only to say something, anything. In this case, he thought the kid was probably right, but maybe his opinion was too biased, influenced by events that occurred years ago.

Zlinzee smiled the first real smile in what felt like hours, and it was like sunshine breaking through the clouds. "That kid, as you call him, is the most empathetic of us all. His abilities to sift through truth and fiction are prodigious- I trust his judgment more than I trust my own, or any of my older advisors'."

He grinned a little bit at that, thinking the boy was very lucky he was so believed in. But still Jim was on edge, anxiety glittering on the edge of his consciousness. "Zlinzee, your people aren't safe here," Jim said, sobering the mood. "None of the people on this planet are. If what you tell me is true, then very few of them are going to side with your brother. They'll be wiped out." Genocide, hissed the voice in his head. He silenced it with a knife through the heart.

"I know," and she sounded exhausted, but she looked at him with defiance and sunlight. "But there are pirates among us."

____________________________________________

The moss had begun to glow when Jim and Zlinzee exited the stone cathedral, and it seemed the entire village had poured out of their houses into the square. They surrounded the huge fire pit, laughter and songs and drum rolls resounding. Some looked up at the emergence of their leader and the stranger, but most continued chatting until Zlinzee sang. It was soft and simple, three notes drawn out, leaping an octave and falling gracefully into silence. Immediately, all went quiet, watching her with glowing intensity.

Jim shifted Jamie in his arms, unconsciously shielding her from the curious gazes all around. The tall fire flitted and licked across their faces, accentuating their fearsome features but framing them in an angelic gleam. It was only after searching through the sea of faces that he managed to spot Ruhn on the far side of the fire, standing with his mother and the rest of his family. Discreetly, Jim peeled away from Zlinzee to circle around the congregation.

He was just falling into step beside Ruhn when the yijuuf began to speak. "As many of you know, another bombing has been reported not far from our tribe." A chorus of murmurs rose, not surprised, but concerned nonetheless. Some looked at him sympathetically, likely having heard that he was injured in the attack. He smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring manner, holding Jamie a little bit tighter.

Zlinzee looked at her feet, suddenly seeming unsure of herself when presented with the weight of what she wanted to say. For an instant she caught Jim's gaze, then looked away just as quickly, a new resolve etched in her stance. "It is no longer wise to assume that we are safe, if it comes to light that what I believe is true." Briefly she summarized Ruhn's theory about Janin, waiting for the shocked cries to die down each time a particular bit of information struck a chord.

Jim watched with some degree of familiarity the chaos around him. It was much like his own crew, rampant and seemingly disorganized, but comfortable to one who was accustomed. "It is at this time I would like to remind you all of the story we've all grown up on, and the true meaning behind it: outside our planet, there is both great evil, and fantastic good. Gather now, those who wish to perform." With that, Zlinzee disappeared into the crowd.

Confused, Jim turned to Ruhn to ask what was happening- but the boy was gone, weaving through the ocean of bodies to stand in front of the reaching fire with six other men and women. All but one of them were slim and lithe- it was only the seventh, a blue woman, who was curvy and heavy-breasted. The rest of the Frooliins spread out, making a large semicircle around the seven in front of the fire. As one the crowd sat down- Jim being pulled down by Frunize- all watching the small number.

It was a tall violet man who began. He held out one hand, slim and six-fingered, towards the ever-cloudy sky. The hand curled into a fist at the same time it began to shimmer, the violet coloration slipping into something black and deep. Jim watched with fascination as the color glimmered up his arm, spreading rapidly over broad expanses of skin. Chromatophores, Jim realized. Spock would have had a field day with this.

When the man's skin had completely morphed into inky blackness, spiraling patterns of white, silver, and blue began to emerge at random points over his body. Within seconds, he was the night sky. Gently he touched the woman at his side, who began to change as well, and in turn touched another. Soon all seven were draped in the night, a shimmering firelight shawl over the stars reflected on their skin.

Someone was beating a drum in a slow, pounding beat, shaking the ground with its rhythm. The star people danced, blending into one another as they weaved and twirled. Ruhn was particularly agile, Jim noted with some amusement, and his small size certainly served him well. After several minutes, the beat sped up a bit, and the human-bodied woman stepped forward. Like the man before her, her skin began to shift, this time from the inky representation of space to deep, rich brown. She was becoming the good human woman, the one from Zlinzee's story.

The tall man from before now changed back to blue, likely representing Zlinzee's grandfather. He and the woman danced, holding each other close, before the woman broke away and spread out her arms, signaling three other Froolins to change back to their normal colorations and kneel to her, adoration and respect on their faces. She tilted their chins up, wordlessly told them to stand, held them in as high regard as they did her. A man in the background changed his skin to tan, becoming the human man who watched her with rage and envy.

The remaining star people returned to their normal colorations and they gathered around the evil man, listening as he pantomimed telling them lies. While this was happening, the good woman and Zlinzee's grandfather continued to dance, love in their eyes and in the gentle way they touched one another. Again she broke away, casting a smile over her shoulder. Before she could look forward again, the Frooliins listening to the evil man were upon her, miming the thrust of ten knives through her chest.

Zlinzee's grandfather fell to his knees in grief as the woman died, shifting again to the night sky and standing completely still, forever a reminder of the good in the stars. The evil man rose to power as the rhythm of the drums swelled and quickened, becoming violent and dark. The Frooliins bowed in trepidation, accepting the foolish god as their new leader, but that anxiety soon turned to resentment when he ordered several of them to death for daring to look unhappy. They too reflected space again, never forgotten to those still living.

Rage grew and grew in Zlinzee's grandfather, forcing out all the love and grief he'd once felt. He stood, and as the music rose to a heart-stopping crescendo, he shoved a ghostly knife through the back of the evil man. The music stopped, and the foolish god fell, turning pitch black on the ground where he lay. Zlinzee's grandfather breathed heavily, his rage decaying, his face collapsing into a terribly cold mask. His people gathered around him, staring down at the body of the foolish god with disgust before they looked to their yijuuf again.

He turned away from the bodies of the good woman and those killed by the foolish god, forever immortalized in the stars. In doing so he was turning away from the sky itself, from any and all beings to exist outside their safe little world. This was a man who had loved deeply and truly, who had had his security ripped away from him by the distrustful and the deceitful.

But as Jim watched, he turned to black, just as the other living Frooliin did. Then Ruhn, one of the living, returned to his normal green coloration. Slowly, curiously, he turned to look at the star people with wonder. Cautiously he stepped forward until he stood in front of the good woman's silhouette. He touched her face, and a surprised murmur ran through the crowd. Obviously, this wasn't a part of the normal play.

Ruhn smiled. He gestured to the other Frooliins, who returned to their normal coloration and gathered around him, staring at the star people with renewed hope, the new generation willing to learn from the mistakes of the past.

That was when Jim decided he had no choice but to stay here. Jamie gurgled in joyful agreement, reaching out a hand as well to the star people.


	7. Chapter 7

It's the first time in five weeks he's seen sunlight, and he weeps, screaming and tearing at dusty ground that sends up eddying swirls of purple ash- and his hands are coated in it and the world is too, so it doesn't matter. There are other kids around him, kids he used to know, kids who had escaped, kids who stare ahead with opaque determination.

He stands tall beside them, because he has no choice, and because the look in their eyes is one he shares. The taste of death on his tongue and memories that already feel years old, memories of agony and just wanting it all to stop. They're all the same, these kids, and Jim finds he hates them for being weak. He hates them for not being better than him.

The man is here, and he inspects each of them lewdly, but none of them are particularly disturbed. This has been their lives for the past five weeks, after all. They don't even seem to realize they're in sunlight now, weak sunlight that feels like frost ghosting over his skin, but sunlight all the same. Jim wonders why they don't notice. It bothers him, and he wants them to notice.

He wonders if they remember why they're here. Sometimes he doesn't, so he really can't expect it of them, but then he'll see Mara being sliced through by a phaser blast and yes, he expects them to remember and to be doubled over with the pain of it. But he can't remember their names. They can't remember who they are. And he hates them for it.

When finally the man stops in front of Jim, tilting his chin up to inspect his face, making sure there is no lingering evidence of his torture, he seems perturbed. "So much anger in so small a boy," the man tuts disapprovingly, dropping his chin dismissively. "I knew it would survive, even if you didn't." He taps his head, as though bragging about his intelligence, even though his statement hadn't made any sense. Jim doesn't reply.

He leans forward, and Jim feels the lingering shadow of disgust over his skin when he feels the man's breath against his ear. "You're different, Jim," he whispered. "You stare like them and you listen like them, but they don't cry like you do. Are you angry, Jim?"

No, he wants to scream. No, I'm not angry. I'm scared. I'm so goddamn scared and I just want to go home. But everyone at home is dead, so he's not sure what to do. He shakes his head, because the man is expecting an answer, and because Jim is, too.

"You're going to find your friends," the man says to all of them now, his voice loud, like it was in the cell. "Find them, tell them you know where to get food, and lead them back here. If you do it quickly, you'll get to die with them."

Okay, Jim thinks. That sounds easy, and very generous of him.

"If you don't do it quickly, they will be tied up beside you, and this time, you won't be coming outside any time soon."

So there's the catch. Jim doesn't waste any more time, and he is the first to leave the orderly line, nodding his understanding in the man's direction. He remembers these friends like he remembers everything else, crystal-clear and chaotically stacked in his head, and he cares about them, at least he did. So he'll do them a favor and get them killed now, before- before-

Funny. Hunger seems like such a terrible way to die now.

____________________________________________________________

Jim awakened to Zlinzee's fingers softly tracing the curve of his lips. Her eyes were warm and deep and half-lidded, a little bit sad as they followed the trace of his jawline through the growing stubble. "I am sorry my world hurts you so," she whispered, her black hair falling like a curtain over the ashen grass. "Tell me, Jim, why do you make these sounds? What are you seeing?"

He watched her sparse brows furrow as she turned on to her side to face him. Jamie squirmed in the crook of his shoulder before settling again with a soft, contented sigh. Rare, watery sunlight danced over the three of them, illuminating their little spot on the grassy hill above the river. If he listened closely, he could pick out Ruhn's voice amongst the children playing in the water, a constant, steady timbre.

The corner of his mouth quirked upward instinctually, even as his heart was still roaring in his ears, a pounding rhythm of pain fear get away don't remember never remember. "You remind me of someone," he said sleepily, closing his eyes again.

"What was her name?" Jim's eyes snapped open, and Zlinzee smiled at him cheekily, delighted as usual by his reaction to her astuteness.

"That's not funny," he murmured, a prickle of grieved irritation making itself known. Jamie shifted restlessly, all her kind's empathy already manifesting itself in her young mind.

The yijuuf hummed thoughtfully, her hand trailing upwards to rest against his cheek. She was still smiling, but it was softer now, not apologetic, but gentle. "No, I suppose not," her long fingers slid back to card through the soft hair at the nape of his neck. "Death isn't a funny thing. But then, neither is suffering, is it?" Those golden eyes watched him, studied him, understood him. "And yet so many try to make light of it."

Jim saw what she was doing- she had a deep dislike for his habit of deflection- so he answered her. Partially, as much as he could. "Her name was Gaila," he closed his eyes again, feeling Zlinzee's fingers gently massaging his scalp. "You would have liked her."

"Any friend of yours is a friend of mine, Jim," she answered easily.

"She was an Orion," Jim went on. He wasn't sure why, when moments before he had been so reluctant to speak. "She, uh… she had a rough past. I never got the full story, but I know… I know she was part of the trade." The very thought of it made him sick.

"You are angry."

"I'm always angry."

"No. You are always afraid. Rarely are you angry."

"Shut up."

Several moments passed before both collapsed into uncontrollable giggles, warm and relaxed and frighteningly intimate. Three days was all it took, and they were entwined, steady with the other near, barriers collapsed and turned to dust. Zlinzee was right, as usual. Jim was very, very afraid- because this had happened before.

"You're thinking about the legend now," Zlinzee observed when finally their laughter subsided after sufficiently disturbing Jamie out of her light doze. The infant was staring at Jim now, as curious as the woman whose skin she shared.

"It's happening again," he answered with some amount of hesitation. "Just like before."

She hummed again, thoughtfully plucking at the ashen grass and sprinkling it in Jamie's hair, who squealed in delight and tried to bat her hands away. "You enchant me, Jim," her honesty was beautiful and terrible as always, and it stole his breath away. "Three days, and I very much love you. My grandfather- it was the same for him, and for the good woman." Her hands stilled, and she watched him. "I will not allow for the story to repeat itself, Jim."

Because he was Jim Kirk and he learned damn fast, he knew the love Zlinzee spoke of. He leaned forward and pressed his forehead to hers. She breathed out, her breath a soft puff against his face. Deeply, truly, intimately- entwined so cruelly. This love was not the love between Spock and Uhura or Sulu and Chekov- it was the love of the good woman and the wise king, not romantic- never romantic, but all-eclipsing and all-consuming. They were one and the same.

"The Orion girl, Gaila," Zlinzee's whisper brushed his nose. "She saw the good in you."

Jamie's tiny fist squeezed his finger, and he smiled into the space between his and Zlinzee's mouths. "And I see the king in you."

____________________________________________________________

"I can feel something coming, when the air is like this," Ruhn told him as the world's meager light began to dim and the moss began to glow. They sat side-by-side on the cliff, facing out towards the woods with the meandering stream gurgling below them and the slight wind buffeting their skin. The boy was eating one of the strange blue-violet fruits, a Shar'k'yui, and staring unfocusedly at some point in the distance.

Kress and a smaller, yellow-skinned boy sat behind Jim, playing with his hair in all the fascination of childhood. All the Frooliins had long black hair, sleek and shiny down their backs, so Jim's short golden strands were a source of endless entertainment for the little ones.

Kress was Zlinzee's younger sister, but the two bore little resemblance. She was a serious and uncompromising little girl, her face ugly without mirth if she wasn't with the yellow-skinned boy, whose name was Canfir. She had taken it upon herself to educate Jim on many of the Frooliin's cultural and biological factors. He had learned, for example, that she and Canfir were betrothed, and happily so.

The reproductive system of the species was rather remarkable; children, once they reached the age of eighteen, stopped growing. They would remain that physical age, practically immortal, until they found a mate, and only when pregnant or nursing young children would a woman develop the human-like build. A pair were only able to mate if their skins were of complementary colors, so a yellow-skinned could only breed with a purple-skinned, a blue with an orange, or a red with a green.

Any offspring produced by one of such pairs would be any of the other four colors on the spectrum, but never did they share a coloration with either parent. Bonds between compatible pairs were often formed during childhood, as the two children showed, or one would abstain from forming any sort of bond- as Zlinzee had, nearly twenty years prior.

Jim turned his head slightly to look at Ruhn, making Canfir huff in irritation when his extremely unsuccessful braid came undone. Jim had taught both the children how to braid hair, but they didn't seem to understand that the process would only work on long hair. "What're you thinking, Ruhn?"

The boy twirled the remains of the fruit in his hand. Just the other day, Jim had touched one of them that had been bruised by a fall, with beads of blue juice forming in the resulting indent. The pain had been instantaneous and intense, shooting through his nerves and numbing his entire arm for a good hour. Apparently the juice contained a powerful toxin that bound itself to pain receptors in humans. It would have been nice to know ahead of time.

Ruhn frowned, a soft breeze ruffling the frills of his ears. "I'm not sure. There is- tension. In the air, in the woods, running through blood. It's electricity, and when the air is like this, it's everywhere. Like something is building."

Jim sighed and thought of Jamie, wrapped in Chenla's arms in her hut as she nursed. Whatever was going to happen was to happen soon, if Ruhn's word was anything to go by, which it always was. He should probably be more afraid, but at this point, he was just waiting for the inevitable.

"I've felt it recently, as well," Kress spoke up. One of her sharp teeth was out of line, and it protruded permanently over her bottom lip. "I do not have Ruhn's gift, but even I know…" she looked at Canfir, and he nodded to her, like some unspoken conversation had passed between them. "Our world is kindling, Jim. We are waiting for the spark."

"Zlinzee wants us to leave," Ruhn said. Jim looked at him, surprise and hurt dancing over his face. Zlinzee hadn't said anything of the sort to him. Ruhn hastily explained, "she did not tell me, Jim. I could tell. The village is no longer safe for us. She thinks the tribe should leave, live in the woods, wait for the storm to pass."

"She wouldn't ask that of us," Kress interjected heatedly, her violet skin bleached across her tightly clenched knuckles. "My sister knows we will fight, should we need to."

"Against what?" Ruhn replied, softer than the girl. "We have theories, Kress. We have ideas and half-thought-out plans should anything arise. What are we fighting against? What are we fighting for? Are our lives in danger? There are too many variables, too little information, too much to sort through."

Restlessness pulsed underneath Jim's skin like static. These were children, worrying about something they should not have to, responsibility resting on their shoulders when they should be careless. It was familiar and Jim cast it from his mind. "I'm with Kress on this one, kid," he said. "Running away would be pretty spectacularly uncool."

"I am not sure what temperature has to do with this situation, but I accept your opinion as valid," Ruhn replied snippily in that 'shut-the-fuck-up-Jim-you're-not-helping' way of his. "Even if it is horrendously premature and impulsive."

"What can I say? I'm a child." Jim grinned, looking out at the forest and wondering why the silver didn't dull with the night.

Then it was gold and red and he didn't realize what it meant until he felt the heat across his back.

Then he heard the explosion.

Then he heard the screams, and he wasn't entirely sure if they were real or not.


	8. Chapter 8

They were just out of reach of the reaching, snarling flames, but Jim could feel them ghosting over his back, teasing parodies of those horrendous wounds not very long-healed. Jamie, he thought, but it was less of a thought and more of bone-deep ache that came ringing through his ears and pounding out his heart into his blood.

He was on his feet and he was floating, buoyant on fear and adrenaline, kill destroy stay alive tapping a steady pitter-patter with his heartbeat and matching the footsteps running behind him, children too young and too not hungry to see their home burn.

For a moment Jim was confused, because where the village should have been was a billow of choking black smoke. But it was already thinning, forming a thin coating over every structure and allowing the fire to glow through in frighteningly stark relief. There were screams and heaving breaths and the breathing was coming from him, great hyperventilations that ripped from his throat because he couldn't calm down and his eyes were crusted over with tears and smoke and fear.

He didn't pause and neither did the children, brave stupid children so young, and they were in the fray of panic and crumbling stone. Out of the corner of his eye, Jim saw a man pinned beneath a wall, a woman weeping over his lifeless body, silvery blood gleaming in the firelight as it pooled around his form. Jim ignored the scene, seeing nothing but the pictures in his mind's eye of a sweet baby girl with sharp little teeth and huge golden eyes.

In the center of the town he spun, surveying a landscape that was completely unrecognizable, nothing like the place he had come to love and loathe. Disoriented by the smoke and noxious, burning fumes, he forgot for a moment where he was- the dirt under his feet wasn't gray stained with black but was rich brown and there was food here once- and then he recognized the charred remains of the building to his right, and the rhythm shivering in his heart slowed.

Chenla's home had been nothing spectacular, nothing grand or eye-catching. It was a plain old stone building with spires and pillars that were engraved with faded images of stars and humans, not so much different from the buildings on either side. But Jim had spent many hours there, with Chenla, with Jamie, because the Frooliin woman had taken it upon herself to feed the baby. Jim wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to thank her properly.

Now that beautiful old house was a heap of rubble and it was crumbling, burning, an ocean crashing on a shore but without the beauty of the disaster. He'd heard so often about the powerful elegance of a wildfire, but he'd seen people burn and he knew there was no beauty in it. There was no glory in watching a home fall.

He pushed past a stone, smearing black over his hands and scraping abrasions on his palms, heat radiating all around him and smoke in the air and he heard wet, gurgling breaths, and saw silver on the ground, and his face felt cold.

Chenla's hand, even darker green now that the opalescent blood flowing through her veins was spilling out onto the ground, brushed against his ankle. He knelt, and for a moment he couldn't hear her, because there was a dull roaring in his ears and there was blood bubbling on her lips and a wall had her pinned, leaving only her head, shoulders, and one arm free. Her other arm appeared torn at the shoulder, managing to just barely hold the wall up several inches off her torso, muscle and bone exposed.

Her lips twitched, that dark hand rising enough to clutch his own. He held it tightly, kneeling beside her, fire leaping around them, and he was too cold to care. "Jim," she whispered, blackness rippling over her skin, those tiny chromatophores dying and leeching away her color. There was a fierceness in the gold of her eyes, a screaming exhaustion that made the flames look dim. "Lift the wall a bit, just a bit…"

He did as he was told, his fingers scrabbling on the rough stone, and saw that in the several inches Chenla had saved over her chest were two little shapes, protected only by the wavering, insurmountable strength of that one mangled arm. She shifted, pushing the dust-covered infants out into the open, ignoring the scream of terrified young lungs and wide, desperate eyes.

"Try to roll out, Chenla," Jim gasped, his muscles straining. "I can't lift it more, you have to get out."

"Jim," she whispered. "Put it down." She sounded exhausted and weak and satisfied, like her organs and legs weren't crushed and she wasn't dying and her yellow-skinned baby wasn't watching. Again he did as he was told, and she made no noise as the weight settled on her. Some long-buried instinct told Jim to run, told him when hope was lost.

For the time being he ignored the instinct, and knelt beside the now black-skinned woman, the fierce and sweet Frooliin mother who had taken in the baby and scarred young captain. He took her hand, grasping it tightly, the cold seeping into the burns on his palms. She smiled at him, the twitching of her lips offset by dancing shadows and silver blood. "You are so young, Jim."

Jim wasn't entirely sure what to say to that so he smiled and his eyes were dry because he needed to get through today. He needed to get Jamie and get out and he would grieve later when he had time and he could risk falling apart completely. "Your mother would be so proud," she continued, and he almost sobbed at that, but he kept it confined in his heartbeat where it took up residence beside the bodies of children. "Keep our babies safe, Jim," her eyes were sliding closed, but she was still smiling. "Keep my world safe."

Chenla died like that, the smile finally slipping from her face, leaving in its wake the most peaceful expression Jim had ever seen on a person who was dead. He dropped her hand, watched it fall claw-fingered on the ground, saw it splash in her silver blood. He scooped up the babies in his weak, weak arms that couldn't save her, and he stood.

Jim turned away from the body, not hearing the yellow-skinned baby's cries or seeing his hands reaching out to his mother. Jamie clutched onto him, content to burrow in his arms, away from the fire she had seen too much of in her short life. He walked as though in a daze, out of the crumbled building, into the center of the old village. Had another bomb fallen? He hadn't noticed. He was cold.

"I'll kill them," he heard himself say into the scorching air, heat distorting his vision. The villagers were fleeing, saving who they could from the wreckage, screams of anguish punctuating each death. They were streaked ghoulishly with blood and soot and burns and some pushed past him, telling him to get out while he could. "I promise, I'll kill them all, I swear." Who was he promising? Jamie, Chenla, Ki'one's unseeing eyes, everyone he couldn't save and everyone he would fight to the death to save. He'd kill who was behind this, tear them apart, starve them.

Soft fingers brushed his cheek, and he felt himself flinch as though struck. His weary eyes focuses on Zlinzee's solemn face, the hard line of her lips, the ash obscuring her skin's color and silver blood gluing one eye shut as it ran down from a cut on her forehead. "Come with me, Jim," she murmured, and whatever she saw on his face made her own crumple in sadness and pity. "No one will hurt them. I promise."

From his arms she pried the yellow-skinned baby, whose cries had tapered off to aborted half-whimpers of hollow grief. "We need to go," Zlinzee said urgently, nudging him in the direction where other villagers huddled at the edge of the forest, watching their home burn. "Walk."

He stumbled over stone and what may have once been an arm, and though he felt Zlinzee's hand splayed on his back he couldn't seem to find his balance while his vision swam and the world tilted underneath him. "I need to help," he protested weakly, "there are people trapped, they need us." His voice sounded strange in his own ears, like an underwater echo, scraping like glass and broken fingernails.

At the edge of the forest with the other villagers in a sullen huddle, Zlinzee pushed him down by the shoulders until he kneeled in the grass. She crouched in front of him and brushed soot from his cheek with her thumb, naked sadness etched in the lines of her face. "There's nothing we can do, Jim," she murmured, like she was apologizing. "But this isn't over."

________________________________________________

"Come with me," Jim told the young boy hidden under a withered holly bush. He forced his lips to smile in an approximation of what it once had been. "C'mon, Ki'one. I know where to find food!"

"You're not James," the boy with dark, dark eyes and pointed ears said. He stared, seemingly impassive, calculations dancing like wildfires in his eyes. The fortitude with which he spoke was offset by the trembling of his small, underfed body, scraped and hidden from the elements.

Sharp pain sparked in his left thigh. They never did heal the brand. "No, I'm not. My name's Jim now." He kept smiling, held out a hand. "Come with me. We'll find the others, and then we can eat. Would you rather sit here and starve?"

The boy's teeth clenched. "You're not James," he said again, shaking his head. "They hurt you, and now you're not… you've been gone for weeks. What did they do, James? Why did they…?" Ki'one's voice dropped, cutting off abruptly like a choked sob. But he was a Vulcan, and no emotion showed on his face, just like his mother taught him.

"That doesn't matter," Jim insisted. The boy couldn't understand- death right now, quickly, was so much better than what would await him. He had to see- Jim had no choice, no way to let him know, nothing to say that would make sense in the boy's mind. "You have to trust me. They'll hurt you, too, if you don't come with me."

Ki'one shook his head, tears welling in his sharp eyes, grief for his friend and fear. "I'm sorry, James," he said. He reached out, ignored Jim's startled flinch. His hands splayed over his head, from his forehead to his temple, and pressed.

In just one moment, Jim remembered why he was so angry at those other children. And the memories still hurt, still reminded him of the burn on him, still made him quake and feel sick when he drudged them up again. But it was less important now, less consuming- it wasn't the only fate these children had. There was something else.

"I am not strong enough to bury your memories of these past weeks, James," Ki'one said when he had finally come back to himself. "But I have reminded you of why you always fought." He paused for breath, the mind meld having taken more out of him than he would have liked to admit. "Do you understand? We must fight."

Jim nodded, numb, but burning under his skin. The anger was new, and it was gasoline on the fire of his fear. He needed to fight and he needed to kill and he needed to save these kids. He needed to stay alive.

________________________________________________

Jim awoke with a scream in his throat and blood in his mouth from where he'd bitten down on his tongue, trying to keep himself quiet. He sat up quickly and was met with Kress' dull, uncompromising stare. She watched him for a moment, then gestured to the battered bodies sleeping all around them, as though to remind him to keep quiet. He didn't bother asking why she was still awake. He knew why.

Reluctantly he settled down again, curling on his side around the undisturbed bundle of cloth concealing Jamie. The survivors of the bombing had managed to walk hardly a mile before exhaustion won out and they were forced to camp in the woods, huddled in family groups. Soft sobs had persisted for several hours until even those died off into dark, oppressive silence.

He'd felt the accusing glares on his back as they walked through the forest, heard the more superstitious of the Frooliins whisper heatedly about his arrival being bad luck. As was the custom of their people, they hardly went to great lengths to conceal their feelings, and some approached him directly to ask his intentions. There wasn't an answer he could think of, so he said he'd leave if he could, but he knew he wouldn't because Chenla had asked him not to.

Even Kress was colder towards him, resentment sparking off her skin every time their eyes met. But she had good reason to hate him; Canfir had been lost in the fire. Jim may have been able to save the boy, had he stayed with them, but so determined was he to get to Jamie that he'd left them to their own devices. Kress refused to say how he had died, retreating within herself, numbness overtaking the heart she had been willing to give over to her betrothed. Jim felt sick with guilt when he looked at her, so he avoided her gaze as much as possible.

The anger of his dream wouldn't leave him, even as he pressed his face to Jamie's blanket to inhale her sweet, smoke-laden scent. Zlinzee, who had been sleeping beside him, crept one arm around to grasp at one of his hands. Her thumb brushed over his palm, soothing the scrapes and burns he could hardly feel anymore. He felt her press her forehead into his back, and he wanted to push her away, didn't want to feel safe and loved when others had lost it all.

"What are we going to do?" His whisper was muffled by the blanket at his lips, but Zlinzee's tightened hold on his hand told him she'd heard. Her sigh was a puff of hot air against his back and it sent a shiver up his spine. "We can't just run from this."

She shifted a bit, nuzzling into the crook between his neck and shoulder. "I know," her voice was strained and dark. "I truly believe it is Janin who has done this. But I am… conflicted. And that confliction makes me guilty, for has my brother not taken more lives than I care to think about? But he is my brother. And I do not believe he is evil."

"I'll kill him myself." The words made the yijuuf stiffen, as did the sudden rage flowing through him. "I'll slaughter everyone involved with this, I'll rip them apart before they hurt anyone else I swear to God I will," so focused was he on the gruesomely satisfying images in his head he didn't notice he was trembling, or clutching Jamie so tightly to him that the baby was whining softly in concern.

"Jim," Zlinzee's voice was a dull, roaring echo, the hand stroking up and down his trembling bicep a distant tingle. "Jim, come back, you're safe right now, you don't need to fight."

"I always do," his voice was edging on hysterical even when it was softened by his scorched throat, every word burning like acid from the inside out. "I have to fight, I'll kill them all…"

She held him through the night as he shook with rage and fear and a thousand other emotions pounding in his blood laden with memories of starving children and a kind green woman.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're now caught up with real time, so updates will be sporadic from now on, since I have to like. Actually write them. Because they're not written yet. So I have to write them.


	9. Chapter 9

"You're hurting yourself, Jim," Zlinzee's soft hands enfolded his, pulling them away from the crude spear he was knapping at with a sharp stone. Her thumb brushed at the burgeoning cut on his knuckle, smearing crimson over encrusted dirt. She was pretending not to notice the other spears strewn all over the ground, the result of a day's work while the traumatized village attempted to draw themselves together in the ash-colored forest.

Jim tried to tug his hands away, his muscles already shaking from the strain of staying still. "Let go," he mumbled half-audibly, feeling his thoughts returning without a mindless activity to distract him, his fingers twitching in his friend's solid grasp. His feet were numb, his legs curled and cramped underneath him, and it had passed his mind once or twice that his posture didn't feel quite natural- like he was curling in on himself, blocking out life beyond making spears.

Zlinzee repositioned herself, pushing the weapons aside so she knelt in front of him, trying futilely to catch his flighty gaze. "Why are you doing this, Jim? You've hardly spoken all day, and Jamie is crying- Jim, please look at me." He does, just a quick, fleeting glance, before he is looking at their entwined hands again. His chest hurts.

"She's dead, Jim," Zlinzee says it with such sincerity but Jim almost laughs, because God, he misses Bones. "Chenla is dead and it's not your fault." When he doesn't answer she looks angry, like he was doing this on purpose, like he wanted to hurt her with his silence- and then her face softened again, because of course she'd seen.

"We have to fight," he tore his hands from hers, exploding into motion, no longer able to keep still with the flame of fear in his veins. "There's no other way, Zlinzee, we have to-"

Zlinzee grabbed his hands again and the rage he felt was suddenly so vibrant that he stood, shaking, unable to balance on his weak, weak legs, and God, everyone was looking at them now- and Zlinzee was still on the ground, but silver blood was now dribbling from the side of her mouth and she was staring at him with huge, terrified eyes and- and he had hit her.

Dizziness and nausea slammed into him hard, knocking him back a few steps with his hands in the air, palms up, trying to seem nonthreatening and muttering a broken litany of apologies which dissolved into the still, dry air. No one was moving and she was still staring at him with eyes that were as wide and as frightened as Ki'one's, and he had put that expression there, he had hurt her.

There was guilt and anger and shame in his very bones, and he could hardly breathe for the constricting weight of it, crushing his lungs and his breath into tiny jagged pieces that burned with every inhalation. He needed to make it right, fix it, somehow- because he had hurt someone he loved, he had hurt Zlinzee.

"Zlinzee, I-" he broke off as one of the men in the crowd stepped forward, fury making his footsteps loud and exaggerated. Jim's strength had dissipated as quickly as it had appeared and he was left with shaky uncertainty, which blossomed into panic at the man's threatening approach. He stepped back, feeling cornered, his gaze flitting between the advancing Frooliin and Zlinzee, who was still watching him, still silent.

Suddenly she raised a hand, and the man stopped, still glaring silently, and Jim let out the breath he didn't know he was holding. "God, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to-" he cut himself off because his words sounded plastic, like Frank the first time he hit Sam, and now all the silver dust on his skin felt suffocating.

"Why are you here, Captain?" A woman cried from the gathered crowd, a toddler bundled in her arms. She covered the child's face, curled inward, as though protecting her baby from danger- from Jim. Another man stood beside her and nodded, and Kress was staring coldly, accusation making her eyes flash. "Why don't you go back where you came from?"

I want to, he screamed internally, God, I want to go home. But instead he was looking around, the sparse undergrowth panicking him more than ever because he needed to run, right now, and there was nowhere to hide. "We cannot trust someone who tries to hide!" that was another woman, and murmurs of agreement rippled through the crowd. "See how he desires to run. He is secretive."

"I'm not lying about anything!" he said, trying to sound sure of himself, but it came out as a wheezing cry- like he was asking for mercy. "I'm James T. Kirk, Captain of the USS Enterprise- and I came here on a mission to document wildlife- and I've told you all this before! I'm not lying!"

His voice had risen to a yell, and silence fell in response. Zlinzee was getting to her feet, steady now that the shock had passed. Still she watched him cautiously- was she scared of him or for him?- and Chenla's death was going to be for nothing because he was going to be killed right here and right now by a peaceful, honest species.

Krell stepped forward, and the silence only became more deafening. She was as scraggly and tired as the rest of them, but she glowed with an inner fury that turned her golden eyes a liquid, searing shade, and for the first time Jim saw what a beautiful woman she would become- or would have become, if this tragedy hadn't stolen her mate and her smile. "So what if you're not lying?" she muttered, and the knot in Jim's chest moved up somewhere near his throat. "You can't even remember the truth."

Several things happened at once, though everything was dull background noise compared to the first hot and blinding wave of agony that tore through his head, a brilliant explosion of color and white noise that sent him to his knees with no breath in his lungs. Somewhere beyond the gauze of misery, Zlinzee screamed at Krell, something that sounded like panic, like she knew what was happening. And Ruhn appeared in front of him only for a moment before his outline wavered and his outstretched hand morphed into fearsome, shadow-clad claws.

Jim flinched back, away from the hand that wanted to help him, the cataclysmic supernovae behind his eyes ripping away any notion of rational thought- he was burning, the soot scouring his throat and the embers digging into his knees and he didn't want to remember- the fear and the feelings were bad enough without the images, the unshakable certainty that he was there, he witnessed it all, it was him- and he couldn't ignore it or handle it right now this was too much-

A hand on his shoulder felt cool and was likely meant to be soothing, but the shock of it made it feel like another burn- and it was like those weeks after he'd gotten back and he flinched at his own shadow- because he was so afraid and so tired and so helpless. The scream that resounded through the dry, choking air wasn't his own, because his body was locked in the torrent overpowering him- so it had to be Zlinzee, because she still loved him even though he'd hurt her- and he couldn't handle the screaming when his family burned.

Blindly he lurched to his feet, static images shuddering in the white sheet over his vision and briefly he glimpsed Zlinzee and Ruhn and Kress and Jamie (Ki'one and Mara and Kevin and Thomas) and when he staggered away they didn't follow him.

___________________

McCoy took great pride in his work, and contrary to popular belief, he rather enjoyed it. He loved the overjoyed look on a young ensign's face when he told her that the kind, cool superior officer she'd been pining over would recover from her flu just fine, or the relief that said superior officer expressed having been told she could return to duty. He loved the accomplishment and the happiness and the feeling like a god.

But if there was one person in the world who could remind him that he was only human, it was Jim Kirk. The kid had so much energy he could give a man a heart attack just chasing after him, "as though I had nothing better to do today, Jim!" and that was without all the shit he got up to as Captain.

He'd always known, on some level, that there was something very off about Jim. Something other than the flinching and the abandonment issues- he knew enough about psychology to recognize the signs of child abuse- festered under the surface of golden smiles and a devil-may-care attitude. He never pushed, even though he could barely stand the look on Jim's face sometimes- the one that spoke of rage and fear long buried.

How he learned about Tarsus IV wasn't all that climactic. He'd expected that someday, something would set Jim off and he would reveal the truth behind that look he got when he thought no one was watching. But there was nothing, at least nothing that McCoy knew of. It just happened, which seemed a little strange, but not all too unlikely for sufferers of PTSD, he supposed.

One day in their second year at the Academy he walked into their dorm, and there was Jim, sitting on his bed, knees curled to his chest. McCoy was a little concerned at first by the blank, unmoving stare the man wore, and that concern deepened to full-fledged panic when he saw the raw and bloodied skin of the kid's arms.

"You know, when you starve," Jim's voice sounded so far-away and empty it seemed for a moment he was a different person entirely, picking at his arms with swift, deft movements, tearing away clumps of hair and flesh. "When you starve, your skin starts to grow all these little hairs. Real soft, downy ones, like bird feathers, and they grow everywhere because you don't have any fat left and your body can't insulate itself."

The methodical plucking had left Jim's arms almost bare, and to say McCoy was confused couldn't begin to suffice- because he was terrified and frozen and he'd never seen Jim like this. "What're you doing, Jimmy?" he said it as softly, as steadily as he could, stepping forward as much as he dared.

"It feels unnatural, the hair," Jim continued as though he hadn't heard him, his picking suddenly morphing into erratic scratching, leaving white furrows dragging across the red skin. "I picked it all off when I got back but it always grows in again. I know it's not the same- it's normal hair, the hair you have if you're not starving, but I still-" some emotion finally showed on his face, a flicker of uncertainty, silent torment. "My fingernails never fell off. It's weird, because everyone else's did, so- so if I don't have that pain, I have to make up for it somehow-"

Having had enough, McCoy closed the distance between them and grasped hard the bony wrists of his best friend. Immediately, he knew it was the exact wrong thing to do. Practically the first rule when dealing with a victim of PTSD was never to touch them without express permission, and when every line of Jim's body went stiff and brittle under his touch, it was obvious that permission hadn't been granted.

The tension in Jim's arms snapped suddenly, and McCoy was thrown backwards with the force of the punch that caught him in the windpipe. He sprawled back against the bed, unable to suck in a wheezing breath before Jim was upon him, his hands scrabbling to get a firm hold on McCoy's neck. His eyes were wild, animalistic, lost somewhere beyond their little dorm room, the emotion churning within them standing in stark contrast to the blank, expressionless planes of his face.

McCoy tried to pry the grasping hands from his neck to no avail, managing only to aggravate his friend into further tightening his grip. "Jim," he choked, his eyes struggling not to roll back in his head and his lungs burning with their yearning for air. "Jim," he could hardly manage the second utterance, his muscles suddenly too weak to continue his desperate struggle.

As suddenly as the assault began, it ended, with the hands loosening and then flying away from his throat, the world spinning as it tried to right itself in the wake of a catastrophic collapse- and then he was heaving in great gasps of air, his diaphragm spasming with the strain of it, and Jim's voice echoed loud and panicked in his ears.

"Bones," Jim whispered, his hands moving to cup McCoy's face, gingerly touch the blossoming bruises on his throat, rub soothingly across his back and ease the ceaseless rippling in his chest. "Bones, Bones, God, Bones I'm so sorry, Bones," it was a litany that was comforting in its humanity, in its lacking the wooden countenance of moments before, and McCoy wished he could speak, only to say it wasn't Jim's fault.

Jim didn't talk to him for two weeks after that. He was terrified, obviously, and he showed it in the way he vacated their dorm, staying with Gaila or some other friend, in the way he wouldn't even look at him during their classes. A week after the incident, McCoy mustered up enough courage to ask Pike for access to Jim's personal records. It was all there for him, typed up neatly and clinically, and he spent the better part of that night throwing up.

They never talked about it. When Jim finally returned to their dorm, with his bag he never unpacked slung over his shoulder and his eyes observing the ground intently, it was when McCoy was sitting at the desk with his PADD in hand. He didn't look up, and he didn't speak for a long moment. "So. Tarsus, huh?"

When Jim didn't reply, McCoy looked up. The kid was standing there still, staring at the same place on the floor, his hands shaking minutely. Finally he gave a tiny, jerking nod, like even that tiny admittance was too much. McCoy stood up and hugged him tightly and they never mentioned it again.

So, yes, McCoy knew about Tarsus. As far as he knew, he was the only person without any real authority over Jim to know about it, and that was humbling unto itself. But sometimes, sometimes it seemed that Jim himself didn't know.

There were days when the strange look on his face wasn't one of dread or fear, but instead of confused apprehension, like he was looking at someone whose name he couldn't place. These were Jim's "good days," days when he wouldn't have nightmares or flinch when someone brushed against him or stare at food like it was the single most confounding thing on the planet. Logically, that meant the strange gaps in memory were a good thing. But there was something insidious about them.

Because when Jim had "bad days," he crashed and burned, like every memory he shoved away was coming down on him in a scalding wave. He quaked under the pressure, his every little quirk exacerbated into full-fledged symptoms of disorders McCoy didn't want to name and somehow Jim had managed to hide it all for two years- or had McCoy simply not been paying attention?

Eventually, the picking stopped, at least. McCoy had managed to convince Jim to begin taking medication for his OCD, but it had made him depressed and lethargic, so instead he relied on sheer force of will to suppress his compulsions. It hurt to see his best friend so obviously struggling not to harm himself, even if it was involuntary, but he had to admit his admiration for Jim's strength and resolve. He would never tell him that, of course.

Now, he sort of wish he had. He wished he had told the kid a lot of things, honestly- God, he wished he had told him just how much he was loved and that he was worthy of being loved, dammit, he was worthy of the stars. But Jim- well, Jim was gone. Not dead, not alive, just gone.

These thoughts that tormented him could be suppressed during the day, when he drowned himself in his work, but now in the privacy of his quarters he couldn't help but allow them to slip into his conscience. With a hearty sigh he put his PADD down on his desk, knowing he wouldn't be able to concentrate on the report as long as he kept thinking about his friend.

McCoy sat that way for what felt like hours, staring at the fine grain of his antique wooden desk, the silence of the ship more oppressive than he'd ever known to be possible. Even the omnipresent whirring of her internal mechanisms seemed dull, softened by a lack of inspiration. Everything seemed quiet now, even the silver flash of stars and the bright whisper of alien frequencies.

He was torn from his reverie by a pleasant voice outside his door. "Doctor McCoy, may I come in?"

It took him a moment to fully grasp the request, but finally he replied. "Yes, come on in, Lieutenant Uhura."

The door slid open smoothly, and McCoy rose to meet his friend. The two had grown close, especially after the incident with Khan, and their shared frustration over their Captain's reckless behavior was a point of bonding for them. Despite this, McCoy still wasn't sure about her relationship with Jim- she most certainly didn't dislike him like she did before, and it seemed sometimes that they were tiptoeing on the edge of something more- and if anything, it seemed Spock approved. Sometimes, McCoy caught the stoic Vulcan gazing at Jim with that look he reserved only for Uhura.

Of course, McCoy wanted to keep his head, so he never questioned any of them about it, but he never missed the warmth that seemed to emanate from the three whenever they were together.

Today, Uhura surprised him. As soon as he came near her, she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him close. For a moment he stood, not entirely sure what the protocol was for this, but eventually he encircled her waist loosely with his arms. "So, er, to what do I owe the pleasure?"

She gave a strangled, euphoric laugh, her warm breath puffing against his neck. "We get to go back for him, Len," she was shaking the slightest bit, a cathartic wave of anxiety and excitement, her joy tempered by the knowledge that they could be signing up for a fruitless search. "We're going to bring him home."

McCoy found that he couldn't quite speak, so he laughed instead, his grip around his friend tightening imperceptibly. He wanted to tell her everything he knew- the truth, as gory and agonizing as it was, all the things that Jim Kirk was hiding from, all the things that he knew would come to light in the wake of- of whatever he was going through now. Because McCoy knew in his heart that the Captain was alive, and he was still afraid of what they would find.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is legit the first new chapter I've written since June. Because I'm trash.
> 
> Also, does anybody know how to get rid of the notes from the first chapter? I'm a noob.


	10. Chapter 10

Jim stumbled blindly in the direction Ruhn had been facing the day before, when he said he felt that something was coming. That conversation seemed to have transpired a lifetime ago, when this planet was beautiful, when he could see anything other than the pulsing images flitting like bats through his head. Every step lanced through him as he followed the trace of an instinct he felt in the marrow of his bones, and this part of the forest was covered in dust or ash, he wasn’t sure, but translucent clouds of shimmering silver kept rising around him, feathery and choking and for a moment it was like the start of the blight, when they burned all the bodies they could.

“How many kids were with you at the end, James?”

“Twelve.”

“How many did you have at first?”

“Twenty-two, I think.”

“What happened to them? The ones that died?”

“They starved. Or they were killed, or they gave up.”

He fell to his knees once or twice, tripping over a stray root that seemed to be reaching for him, grasping with cruel, pale fingers, blanched with death and broken into knobbed, rough protrusions, but each time he stood and pressed on with a dogged determination to find some kind of relief, some respite from the hammering rhythm of voices in his mind.

“How many other kids saw his face?”

“Eight.”

“Who were the others?”

“I don’t know their names, except for Kevin and Thomas. Everyone else forgot.”

“Why did they forget?”

“They were soldiers.”

“Were you a soldier, too?”

“I would have been.”

The trees were roaring beasts reared up on sky-high legs, their shaggy moss-like bark turning into wooly fur. Everything was a monster, Jim realized, everything was death and this beautiful planet was dying, just like a planet he’d known a lifetime ago.

“What happened to the other child soldiers?”

“They went through with their orders. They rounded up the surviving colonists and lured them to their deaths.”

“How did you escape?”

“I don’t think I ever really did.”

Finally Jim stopped, as suddenly as he had begun running, frozen as a strange thrill moved up through his legs, ending in his fingertips. He gasped, feeling the world was dropping out underneath him, leaving him with this aching cold that tingled in his veins and forced him to his knees with a vice-like grip around his neck, choking out of him a strangled scream that was all at once agony and terror and adrenaline, a surge of terrible memory-

And then it stopped, and he could breathe again, and the world saw fit to right itself on its axis, lurching him flat on the dusty ground. For several long moments he stayed there, unable and unwilling to move, his every shuddering breath sending a gust of sooty earth swirling above his head. He could taste the grit of it in his mouth and feel it clinging to the sweat that slicked his face and neck and chest, and he imagined he was just one of those thousands of bodies left to rot upon the tattered remains of Tarsus IV.

His body curled in on itself and then could move no more, lost to this stagnant world.

______________________

After the long, arduous interviews and more medication and surgeries than Jim cared to count, the doctors finally left him alone in the Sickbay with the rest of his kids- told him to get some sleep, and not to disturb the other children whose slackened faces reflected none of the pain Jim felt. And feel it he did- the real injuries, the deep bruises and hemorrhages and lacerations, all of which would have to heal naturally (“His immune system is too compromised to risk any further operations…”) as well as the ones that had long since healed but still ached.  
Being around so many adults had left him shaken and paranoid like the animal he had been planetside, glancing over his shoulder and making sure he was facing the door at all times, warily eyeing the reaching hands and sympathetically twisted faces. They asked him a lot of questions and he answered them the best he could, dry-eyed and stoic-faced, telling them the complete and utter truth of what had transpired on that desecrated planet- several times, they told him to stop, because even the most experienced officers were fighting back sobs.

Jim returned to his kids and immediately did a headcount- and then another, and another, and another, reassuring himself that this was real, that his kids were as safe as they could possibly be. Even with these adults (“Stay away from adults, Riley. They don’t want to help you, they want to... “) they were safer than they were with him.

So why couldn’t he sleep? Why did he keep counting, again and again with the scars in his skin and in his organs aching and the brand on his leg itching and the fear of something in the dark haunting him? Why was he shaking with silent sobs because he was so afraid of the things in his head that he couldn’t even close his eyes?

Not quite knowing what he was doing, he slipped off the bed, his bare feet hitting the cold ground and echoing too loudly in the room full of mechanical beeping. His arms wrapped around his chest, hugging himself tightly, he limped to where he knew Ki’one’s bed was across the room. He halted at the foot of the bed, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dark. When finally he could see, the first thing he glimpsed was Ki’one’s wide, dark eyes gazing back at him.

Jim opened his mouth to greet him, to express his relief that he was awake, but it died in the back of his throat. Instead a wheezing cry shuddered through him, an inhuman sound of glass-edged agony. Ki’one stared back at him, impassive as always, vulnerability obvious only in the translucent quality of his green-toned skin. “Jim,” the Vulcan boy whispered, slowly raising one slender and gaunt hand.

Jim wouldn’t understand it until years later, but Ki’one was well on the way to death long before that moment. The fever that swept their camp in those last few weeks hit him hard, and combined with the weakness from starvation and hopelessness, there was no way he would have survived the night.

With that shaking and feather-light hand, Ki’one touched Jim’s face, and the older boy had to fight not to flinch away from him. “You should not have to bear this,” Ki’one whispered, his dried lips curling around the words with difficulty. “You have done enough, Jim. When the time comes, I know you will be able to heal from all that has happened- I will give you the chance to find happiness first.”

His fingers slid to Jim’s meld points, a few words were whispered under his breath, and the fires of raw wounds that had blazed moments ago were doused in sudden, all-encompassing blankness- and all that was left was an empty crater of uncertainty.

The next moment, Ki’one was dead, the last of his energy devoured by the sweeping void left in the place of memory. Jim stared at him as the monitors screamed, knowing his name and knowing who he was and knowing the feelings attached to him, but not knowing the significance of it all.

Jim was shoved back by the wave of doctors rushing into the room, shouting to one another in words he couldn’t begin to understand. For a long, long time he stared, blankly recognizing that the boy’s death was probably his fault, Finally, tired of trying to comprehend what he was seeing, Jim turned away and limped back to his bed. One of the doctors called the time. Jim crawled into his bed and was asleep in moments.

______________________

 

When he next awoke, it was to a ceaseless pounding in his temples and a fierce yearning to find Jamie, to hold her in his arms, to keep her safe from the terrors that had traced such deep scars into his mind and body. The next second he ached for his mother, yearned for her ferocity and her wildness and her soft, broken smile and the surety of her judgment- until he remembered the times she had failed him, left him with a man who became a demon and then a planet that became dust.

He still missed her, though.

Movement blurred in front of his eyes, and he lurched, forcing himself into a sitting position despite the aching of his head. Ruhn and Kress crouched beside him, watching owlishly as he struggled to right himself against the world’s spinning. “Wha-” he didn’t manage to choke out any more before a tide of remorse slammed into him and his mouth clamped shut around the questions he wanted to ask. Don’t you hate me? Aren’t you angry? Are you here to kill me?

Ruhn spoke first. “We’ve been searching for quite a while, Jim,” he didn’t reach out, but it was obvious he wanted to. “Why did you run away?”

The question was too simple to embody everything it implied- that Jim’s only wrong was running, that he should have stayed to bear the violence of accusing stares, that Kress hadn’t awoken something in him- and Jim didn’t know how to reply, so he didn’t.  
Kress pressed with a harder tone to her voice, once that would give way to viciousness if she dared look at Jim in the eye. “My sister is alright,” if she was striving to be reassuring, it didn’t quite show through. “She is angry with me, though.”

Ruhn shot a chastising glance at the younger child. “You should have known better. The truths we see are meant not to hurt one another, but to help us in understanding.”

Kress glared back defiantly, her lips curled back a bit to reveal the top row of her sharp teeth. “I understand him perfectly,” she retorted. “I understand that he runs from his own truth and that it is disgraceful. I understand that he has no control over his anger and his fear because he never learned to, never attempted to better himself so he may understand his own limitations and in doing so not put others in danger!” The girl stood suddenly and turned around, obviously not thinking the situation worth her time any longer.

Ruhn stood as well, rushing to grab her arm before she could take another step away. His face was contorted in the same expression of anger, with white streaks of rage manifesting across his green skin. “Why do you insist on being such a fool, Kress? Why do you willfully refuse to see pain beyond your own? Canfir truly was the better part of you- I can see that now! All that is left is your senseless ignorance!”

For all his talk of not using the truth to hurt others, the rage he was inciting in Kress had to qualify as harm. Her ridged cheekbones rippled with animalistic intensity, like she was moments away from ripping limbs off Ruhn. The tension had obviously been growing between them for days, culminating in this final display of fire. Jim could do nothing but watch, entranced and terrified by the change in Ruhn.

“You say this man never attempted to better himself, as though he had control over the things done to his mind!” The boy’s face and voice softened suddenly, his grip on her arm loosening marginally. “How could he face what he could not remember, Kress? How could he overcome that which hid behind a shroud?”

“Don’t-” Jim stuttered, the children whipping around to look at him, Ruhn with suddenly remembered concern and Kress with barely disguised resentment. “Don’t talk like it- like someone did this to me to- to hurt me, or whatever. He just, he was a kid, he didn’t know-” the thoughts in his mind felt disjointed, becoming mixed up in his rush to defend his well-meaning friend. “He thought it was for the best, you know- he could have done it right if he was stronger.”

Ruhn’s wide, mournful golden eyes didn’t so much as twitch, staring at him with a strange mixture of pity and understanding. Beside him, Kress didn’t look quite so forgiving, but there was something on her face, too- she looked ill, like his words implied something much darker.

Unable to stand the horrified looks any longer, Jim pressed on. “The first time he did it didn’t make me forget, it just made me- made me understand, made me see the bigger picture. The second time, right before he died, he made me forget, but it was for the best, okay? I could hardly function, I just- why are you looking at me like that?” The stares hadn’t abated, if anything looking more and more agonized.

“Some truly horrible things must have happened to you,” Kress muttered, glancing away, “for you to be able to justify someone tampering with your emotions.”

Jim swallowed hard, remembering the man whose name he never learned but whose leer found itself into his most pleasant dreams, the guards who whipped him and left him the brand in his leg that was still there, couldn’t be healed by any regenerators, the one he’d slashed at with a kitchen knife when he was fifteen because he couldn’t bear the itching burn of it on cold days when he almost remembered everything and the way it made his mind ache when he didn’t remember and now it was just a mass of parallel scars that still fucking itched and burned- but he blinked and he was back, gasping in a shuddering breath.

He’d told Bones that his fingernails had never fallen out, hadn’t he? That wasn’t a lie- the other kids had wasted away until they were nothing more than brittle bones and bloated bellies and their bodies just couldn’t hold onto their nails any longer. Jim’s had been ripped out, one by one, but it wasn’t the same thing, hunger was the worst way to die, the man had told him so-

“We were just kids, both of us,” he finally said when he could breathe again, glancing up to see Ruhn still staring with that pitying fervor that was going to give him a goddamn complex. “He did what he had to do, and I don’t think I would’ve survived without him.”

Ruhn looked at Kress again with a long, searching glance, as though analyzing an idea never before conceived. “And you would seek to blame him for pain that would have ended his life.”

For once, the girl had nothing to say in response. She looked away grudgingly, conceding to him a point she had so vehemently defended moments before, as though struck by a truth she had never considered. Jim wondered what exactly he had said, what it was that so horrified the children. He hadn’t meant to do that, to scare them more than he already did.

“Hey, I-” he started to speak, pushing his hands underneath him in an attempt to stand. His legs quivered beneath him and his head pounded, a strange lilting noise that felt slanted and broken behind his eyes. “I’m- I’m sorry for running away, and since I apparently can’t give you an explanation that you haven’t already figured out, I’ll leave it at that.” If he sounded annoyed, well, at this point it felt pretty justified.

“Did you go this way on purpose?” Ruhn asked, tactfully dropping the subject, though Kress obviously wanted to say more.

He had to think a moment before he remembered, in those white-hot moments of terror, going the direction Ruhn had been looking when the bombs fell. “Yeah, but I’m not really sure why. Guess I was going to fight Zlinzee’s idiot brother on my own.” He meant it as a joke, but it fell flat and perhaps resonated a bit deeper than intended. 

Surprisingly, it was Kress who expressed abject disagreement. “Impossible. Janin is a manipulator,” she spat the word like it was a curse. “The people under his control would destroy you with a single word from him.”

“And he could destroy your way of life with just the inclination,” Jim retorted. He suddenly felt very weary, and very much like he didn’t want anyone else to die. “Look, guys, just because I’m feeling nihilistic and fifty shades of fucked up doesn’t mean you had to- do whatever it is you’re doing out here. Go home. Or- uh,” he grimaced, “you know. Go to your families. I’ll figure something out on my own, okay?”

Ruhn frowned deeply and shuffled his feet in a rare moment of uncertainty. “We’ve come with others, Jim,” he said, holding his hands up placatingly when Jim looked around for the people who had accused him so viciously the day before. “Not all of them are so distrustful of outsiders. We figured you had decided to confront Janin on your own, and many did not wish to abandon you.”

“So where are they now?” Jim asked, pointedly ignoring the use of the word “abandon” and all its annoyingly visceral connotations. 

“Some are very old, and some very young. They stayed behind to rest a while back, and we went ahead to catch up with you. They’ll be here in several hours, I’m sure.”

Jim looked at the children- really looked at them, the fine nuances of their expressions and the softness of youth in their cheeks. He imagined himself, full grown and not starving, leading people on foot, pursuing only the hope of survival. He thought of Jamie and of his own innocence before the blight, and he thought of Mara when she stepped on a landmine and he awoke to find a fragment of her head, one eye intact and bulging, just in front of his face. He’d thought she was alive at first and had started laughing, because wow, how lucky are we- and then he felt a weight upon his chest and he looked down and couldn’t quite comprehend the arm across his body, so he just kept laughing.

He’s not sure if that was before or after the man in the room and the brand on his leg. Most likely after, that’s when he really started losing people, and he laughed a lot so they wouldn’t lose hope of survival. Jim Kirk, the boy who laughed and laughed and laughed except when he thought about food, because starvation wasn’t funny. Jim Kirk, who pretended everything would be alright. Jim Kirk, manipulator. 

So he smiled at the kids, genuinely. “Yeah, okay. You guys get some sleep while we wait, I’ll watch out for them.”

He was gone when they woke up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha where am i
> 
> sorry im the worst i am TRYING but due to who i am as a person updating is slow. like, this took a year slow. i personally blame capitalism
> 
> Also!!! if you are wondering about the added tags- implied childhood sexual abuse and the life- it isn't because anything is explicitly described or confirmed, though there is some heavily implied squicky stuff you may have caught on to. Mostly the warning is because of how the kids react to what Ki'one did- essentially, they see it as rape, and the language they use shows this. 
> 
> please review!!! it does me a happy!!!

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted on Fanfiction.net, and since I finally have an account here, I figured I might as well upload it. Please tell me what you think!


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